Finding an Ethical Employer: Five Questions to Ask in a Job Interview

by Rushworth M. Kidder

WEST LAFAYETTE, Indiana
In recent weeks, Martha Stewart has gone to jail, the world's largest insurance broker, Marsh & McLennan Companies, has been accused of unethical practices, and Citigroup has agreed to set aside $5.2 billion to cover legal bills arising from its alleged role in various financial scandals.

So it's not surprising that some of the students I talked to last week here at the Krannert School of Management at Purdue University wonder how they can distinguish ethical companies from unethical ones. Are they about to go to work for an Enron, which sank ignominiously into its own ethical morass, or for a J. M. Smucker Company, which now ranks No. 1 on Fortune's list of the 100 Best Companies to Work For? In a job interview, what questions can they ask that will reveal the inner workings of a company's ethics?

Here are five, in rising order of complexity (let's assume you're interviewing with a firm that has a code of ethics, an ethics office, and a significant international presence):

I've read your code of ethics. How important is it in your daily work around here? Does your interviewer know (a) that there is a code, (b) what it contains, and (c) how it can be relevant? Sometimes an honest recognition of problems ("We have a code, but frankly it hangs on the wall and doesn't much shape people's thinking") is far more positive than canned platitudes about "our high standards" -- and can lead to some pretty enlightening conversation.


Ethics offices can focus on compliance and regulations, or on integrity and core values. Where do you think your ethics office comes down on this distinction? While the right answer is probably "On both sides," this question raises a practical concern. Will you, as an employee, have a place to turn for serious, confidential conversation about any basic ethical failings you may see around you? Or will ethics officers only be interested in talking about explicit non-compliance with law or corporate policy?


Given the need to honor diversity around the world, can a global company have a code of ethics that governs every employee without offending any? Some executives feel that ethics creates a Hobson's choice: You either have to take good home-country values and cram them down the throat of every global business unit (which won't work), or you have to adopt a when-in-Rome attitude, letting country managers do things you wouldn't dream of doing at home (which is a PR train wreck waiting to happen). How does the company manage a code of ethics while still respecting cultural distinctions?


Suppose that I, as a manager, am part of a highly confidential decision-making process planning a downsizing. I'm pretty sure that a result will be that one of my longtime staff members, who trusts me implicitly, will be terminated. She asks whether she's in danger of being let go. Should I lie in order to remain loyal? This gets to the heart of executive decision making. Be alert to simplistic responses that are knee-jerk and authoritarian ("Of course loyalty trumps truth-telling") or woolly and pious ("Of course you must always tell all"). If this conundrum doesn't stimulate some thoughtful conversation, your interviewer may think ethics is only about right versus wrong, not about the tough right-versus-right where there's a moral case to be made on both sides. Watch to see, in particular, whether your interviewer is creative enough to suggest a third way forward that honors confidentiality but respects the truth.


Can you think of an example, large or small, where an employee displayed real moral courage in ways that benefited the entire organization? If this question prompts a pat answer about our whistle-blowing policy, keep digging. Try to learn how the corporation has handled legitimate internal complaints from people willing to endanger their progress by speaking up. If what emerges is a portrait of a culture where it doesn't take lots of courage to raise big issues, try to find out why this is so -- and make a mental note that this could be a great place to work.


Put these questions in your own words, of course, and then watch to see how they are received. Note whether (a) you're being made to feel young and naïve for asking them, (b) the interviewer is politely but impatiently answering you, or (c) the result is a thoughtful, engaged conversation. Remember, you're looking less for answers than for a way of answering. What matters is attitude, depth, and interest in the topic, rather than a brusque recitation of facts. You may not need all five: Any one of them can reveal all you need to know.

Will you offend your interviewer if you dare to raise such questions? Possibly. But isn't it better to know that now, rather than to watch your CEO lugged off to jail, your career made impossibly stressful by unethical subcultures, or your retirement vanish into a vortex of scandal and bankruptcy?

Note: The J. M. Smucker Company is a corporate member of the Institute for Global Ethics.

Questions or comments? Please write to newsline@globalethics.org.

http://www.globalethics.org/newsline/members/issue.tmpl?articleid=10180417083675


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Four Ways To Prevent Yourself From "Enroning" Your Small Business
by Tim Fulton

As a business owner or manager, you’ve watched the news on Enron the past few months and sat in amazement at how such a company could have made such a mess of itself. Enron has gone from being the Prince of Wall Street to the Court Jester. Free-falling stock price. Thousands of employees laid off. Retirement accounts insolvent. Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Senate hearings. It's the only news story that could have possibly taken our collective minds off of the 9/11 tragedy and the war in Afghanistan.

As you watched this story unfold, you have considered what a terrible misfortune this has been for the stakeholders in Enron. You have probably also concluded that this type of disaster could never happen to your business. It’s not possible that your small business could get "Enroned." Or is it?

The reality is that small businesses meet this same fate far more frequently than we can imagine. The failure rate for small businesses is staggering. Just take a drive down Main Street and look at the empty storefronts. Take a "surf" on the Internet and search for those websites you designated as favorites a year ago. How many are still there?

How can you protect your small business from being Enroned? Here are four ways:

1. Be honest with your company's stakeholders.

According to news reports, top officials at Enron misled their investors, their creditors, and their employees. Employees were even encouraged to continue to invest more of their hard-earned savings into Enron stock after news of the company’s demise had begun to appear.

Your employees understand more about your business than you imagine or you give them credit for. Attempts to mislead them may provide you with short-term gains, but will cripple your company in the long run. Trust your employees with the truth. If the company is in trouble, share those challenges with your employees and enlist their support in facing those challenges.

2. Keep your business simple.

Enron took great strides to immensely complicate their business. Offshore deals. Limited partnerships. Creative financing. Their CEO, Kenneth Lay, testified that he was not quite sure what exactly was going on within his own company. Others in senior management positions within the company have offered similar testimony. That's a bad sign.

The most successful small businesses I have witnessed are kept as simple as possible. Simple business proposition. Simple financing strategies. Simple exit strategy. Consider a McDonalds franchise. That business has been simplified to the point that a business owner can put a part-time high school student with little or no business experience at the point of contact with customers with minimal training and rest assured that his multi-million dollar business investment is in good hands.

3. Carefully select and manage your external professionals.

This includes your accountant, your attorney, your banker, and others. Arthur Anderson is an excellent global accounting firm. They also have an outstanding reputation as management consultants. Enron made the mistake of hiring the firm for both auditing and consulting purposes. These roles are inherently conflicting and will result in Anderson either going thru a name change or being bought by another firm. Management should have seen this conflict and used Anderson for one job or the other; but not both.

Small business owners make the same mistake. They ask their attorneys for answers to accounting questions and their accountants for marketing advice. They allow their bankers to make key strategic management decisions for them. These are often times colossal mistakes. You need these professionals to provide advice and consultation in their areas of expertise. That's important to the stability and growth of your business.

4. Cultivate the right corporate culture.

Enron had a culture of rule breaking. Individuals went to great lengths to work around United States tax laws and the Internal Revenue Service. When it became evident last fall that their practices were going to be scrutinized, they ordered massive shredding of important corporate documents. What message did these questionable and possibly illegal actions send to the rest of the Enron employees who witnessed these activities? What sense of ethics were expressed in their actions?

Every company, large and small, has a corporate culture or personality. It can either be crafted and cultivated by senior management or it will take a life of its own based on their actions or lack of actions. It is incumbent upon the business owner or general manager to take responsibility for setting the right example for the employees. Their actions will mirror those of their leaders. If the business owner is cheating and lying to customers, it will only be a matter of time before the employees will assume that is right and proper behavior and will do the same.

Enron is not the first and won't be the last global conglomerate to stumble and fall. The key lesson for small businesses is to take notice of the pitfalls that tripped the energy giant and caused it to fall. Those pitfalls can just as easily strike and knock down a small business with far less paparazzi and no multi-million dollar bonus for the owner to fall back on.

Tim Fulton is a nationally recognized small business consultant and advocate. He has been involved in the field of Entrepreneurship for the past twenty years as a successful business owner, a small business counselor, and a university professor. He can be contacted at timfulton@hotmail.com.

Excerpt From
MEGATRENDS 2010: THE RISE OF CONSCIOUS CAPITALISM
By Patricia Aburdene

Excerpt:
The Spiritual Power of Corporate Brands

If values are the hallmark of enlightened capitalism, how do the companies that espouse them broadcast their virtues and beckon discriminating consumers to the cash register? Often, it is through the power of brand—that precious, yet intangible asset that symbolizes what a corporation stands for.

More than a name, logo or “iconic” CEO, a brand is a place in the heart where employees, investors, suppliers—and Conscious Consumers—meet to tell a company’s story, says brand guru Elsie Maio. “When a brand reveals authenticity, values and humanity’s drive toward consciousness, it’s a powerful strategic advantage.”

That said, let’s not underestimate the financial power of brands. The Coca Cola brand, for example, is worth $67 billion, says Interbrand Valuation (all figures for 2004), which puts the value of Mercedes at $21 billion; Dell, $11 billion; Harley-Davidson, $7 billion. Interbrand arrives at the valuation through an analysis of what the brand is likely to earn in the future, including projected sales and profit. Interbrand’s “Global Brand Scoreboard” is published annually in Business Week. In 2004, the company that showed the highest percentage increase over its 2003 brand value was Apple, surprising iPod fans not one bit.

When a brand is tarnished, the balance sheet suffers. Nike stock and sales tumbled after “sweat shop” exposés. But with those troubles behind it, Interbrand Valuations counted the Nike brand’s worth at more than $9 ¬billion.

Through brand, companies discover how values drive performance.

Branding 101

Elsie Maio, president of Maio and Company and designer of the SoulBranding (SM) technology, spent decades teaching corporate America how to position its identity—or brand—to consumers, investors and the public. Maio did stints on Wall Street, at McKinsey & Company and Institutional Investor. In 1983, she joined the firm that helped Walter Wriston craft the identity of nascent Citibank and later worked with Fortune 500 companies like Raytheon, Sun Life, International Harvester and IBM. But today Maio’s mission is unlocking the soul power in brands.

Elsie Maio talks my language, but before I can grasp SoulBranding, I have to ask, so what is “ordinary” branding? Elsie offers a classic definition: It is the process of “building preference for a unique set of characteristics associated with a unique set of identifying symbology.”

Huh?

Why do you buy Coke versus Pepsi? Why choose this kind of brown sugar water over that? Because one or the other promises a certain lifestyle, fun, peer approval or a cool image. Brand is a promise that creates an expectation.

That’s true whether it’s traditional branding or Elsie’s more soulful alternative.

What Is SoulBranding?

Maio and Company offers clients a revolutionary service: It shows them how to position a brand to embody transcendent values. SoulBranding identifies 12 core values that consumers, employees and conscious investors expect companies to stand for: Compassion, Humility, Justice, Courage, Respect, Humanity, Empowerment, Integrity, Wholism, Broader Good, Responsibility, Excellence. “The values are there,” says Maio. “They live in people.”

But how do you draw them out?

SoulBranding employs a self-auditing tool that gives employees (and other stakeholders, depending on the client’s needs) the chance to rate how the corporation scores on these core values. Imagine evaluating your company on Compassion—or Justice, knowing that your opinion will reach the executive suite? The resulting scorecard benchmarks which values a company and its brand broadcast and how well it lives up to them.

But Soulbranding doesn’t stop there. It also calculates what companies must do to win credibility. “We ask, ‘What specific evidence would convince you that the company had changed—or improved?’” says Maio. In the end, clients get a detailed report card, a set of goals and a “snapshot of the milestones of credibility.”

How did brand, Spirit and values get so connected? Much of the answer lies in the Conscious Consumer trend—and the cataclysmic changes in today’s corporate landscape.

A New Day for Brand Managers

Time was, a brand manager could tell consumers just about anything and they’d pretty much “buy” it. PR and advertising mavens would concoct a top-down brand campaign, flood the marketplace with messages and successfully dictate the public’s impressions. But those days are over—and so is traditional brand management.

Today, thoughtful, conscious customers and media-savvy activists carefully analyze corporate behavior. Result? These days companies had better deliver on their promises—or face a possible backlash. That’s why Elsie Maio issues this stern warning to corporations: Invoke values and social responsibility authentically and honestly. Because your promise will be scrutinized.

When British Petroleum positioned itself as an “environmental” firm, says Maio, the company opened up lots of opportunity, but also grew more vulnerable. One slip and watchdogs—or competitors—will enthusiastically point out any inconsistency between a company action and its stated values.

“The promise of a brand, no matter how creatively scintillating,” says Elsie, “is a liability unless the company delivers to all stakeholders.”

Whose Brand Is It?

If experts no longer control a brand the way they once did, who does? I would argue, to a large extent, the answer is Conscious Consumers—and, Elsie tells me, I’m partly right. A brand is co-owned by a corporation and its stakeholders, she says, including, and perhaps especially, consumers.

Elsie cites the example of Monsanto in Europe. “Monsanto had a visionary CEO and great brand managers, but failed to recognize how strongly consumers felt about genetically modified organisms in the agricultural system,” says Elsie. “So, when Monsanto went into Europe, they were shouted down.”

Conscious Consumers hold corporations morally responsible.

How could Monsanto have prevented the debacle? A company can’t avoid people’s reactions, cautions Elsie. “But it can sit down with critics, find shared goals and establish milestones toward achieving them.”

In Elsie Maio’s vision, brand is a living, dynamic, energy fed by stake¬holders, especially Conscious Consumers.

Demand-Side Economics

For better or worse, Values-driven Customers are willing to pay more for products and services that reflect their values, as this chapter repeatedly illustrates:

The NAHB survey that showed 20 percent—the hard-core Conscious Consumers—would spend up to $5,000 for an energy-efficient, ¬environment-saving, healthy building.

We all know a hybrid lover who waited months to pay $3,000 more for a clean car.

Or a natural food advocate who regularly and enthusiastically shells out more bucks at the cash register for organic produce.

As Conscious Consumers compel more producers to satisfy their demand, supply will increase and prices should fall. Meanwhile, Values-driven Consumers remain an unserved market and the next great opportunity for business. But exploiting that opening requires vision—a commodity “business as usual” can’t seem to get its head around.

Listen to Fortune magazine: “Detroit snickered when Toyota first unveiled its Prius sedans, powered by hybrid gas-and-electric engines. But it’s Toyota that’s laughing now: Its hybrids are a runaway hit, outstripping Toyota’s ability to keep up with demand. Smart products and a sterling reputation for quality have lifted Toyota’s share of the U.S. market to 12.2% last year, from 6.4% in 1986.”

As I write this in March 2005, the debt of General Motors is growing. Sales are slumping and earnings may be 80 percent below expectations. One reason sales are off, say commentators, is because GM has no real hybrids to offer (GM’s “mild hybrids” do not compare in either environmental or energy standards to those set by Honda, Toyota and Ford).

Admittedly, Ford has its own financial issues to worry about, but Ford has taken a leadership role in the hybrid sector and that vision may help save the company. Furthermore, when Bill Ford needed to revitalize the River Rouge car plant, where Henry Ford started making Model Ts 90 years ago, he turned to Bill McDonough, the world’s leading green architect.

Result: a $2 billion grass-roofed showplace that cost no more than an ordinary factory and is cheaper to operate. The McDonough-designed natural water-drainage system has already saved Ford Motor $35 million—all the while purifying rainwater of manufacturing toxins so effectively that when the water hits the river, it is completely clean.

Bill Ford calls McDonough “one of the most profound environmental thinkers in the works.” But McDonough is not your typical, anti-growth environmentalist. He’s a green capitalist. His book Cradle to Cradle (North Point Press/Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002)—printed on waterproof, recycled plastic—describes a world where free enterprise and ecology live in harmony.

“The argument in commerce about growth versus no growth is a stupid argument,” says McDonough. “Of course you have to grow; nature wants you to grow, and businesses want to grow.” How, in McDonough’s vision, do capitalism and the environment co-exist? Clearly it is through creativity and innovation, both of which are sourced in the Divine realm of consciousness.

Where did Bill Ford find the power and vision to enter the hybrid market and build one of the world’s greenest factories? Well, it turns out, Bill Ford meditates. How do I know that, you ask? I read it in Time magazine!

Go ahead, laugh, if you want to. But I was once a researcher at Forbes magazine, where my primary responsibility was fact checking. My fellow researchers and I were frequently treated to hair-raising tales about what happened to fact checkers who got it wrong. Believe me, it was not a pretty picture. So I report to you with a high level of confidence that Bill Ford meditates—and with total confidence that Ford manufactures hybrids and builds green factories.

Very interesting, huh?

Goldcorp in Canada: Another Company With the Rule

Today's Globe and Mail has a story on Ian Telfer, chairman of "Goldcorp Inc., the world's second-largest gold producer by market capitalization, called The Dealmaker Shows His Giving Side. Mr. Telfer has a nice discussion of how he applies the rule: Here is an interesting excerpt from the interview with the Globe and Mail:

Are you really a manager?

You have to be. The head office of Goldcorp is 60 people and I probably hired 50 of them. If you get the right people, they can do the job.

There is a bestseller right now called The No Asshole Rule. It is all about: 'Don't hire any assholes.' So I spend a lot of time picking who we're going to hire. You need someone with technical qualifications, but you also have to find someone who can work with other people and respect other people.

Then you give them real responsibility and that is the secret to the whole system. You let them make mistakes. That is what the majority of managers seem unable to do: They can't let someone make even a minor mistake.

I would also add that, in addition to using the no asshole rule, Mr Telfer also applies one of the single most important management practices for any company --to create a safe environment where people are given enough autonomy to make some mistakes, and when it happens, it is used as a learning opportunity. Companies that slam people when they make mistakes create a climate of fear that undermines learning and usually leads to more mistakes -- and effort devoted to hiding errors or avoiding the finger of blame, rather than learning. This is a major point in Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-Truths and Total Nonsense, The Knowing-Doing Gap, and Weird Ideas That Work, and I've blogged about here under "The Best Single Diagnostic Question."

http://bobsutton.typepad.com/

An Interview with David V. Lorenzo, Author of “Career Intensity”


David V. Lorenzo has accumulated over 20 years of experience as a successful corporate executive and entrepreneur. He’s the Founder and President of DLorenzo Business Advisors, a group that coaches entrepreneurs and independent professionals on Business Strategy, Sales, Marketing and Work-Life Balance.

David has been working with the Gallup Organization’s Consulting Group since 2002. In this role, David consults with the leadership of Fortune 500 companies on Executive Performance Management, Succession Planning, Learning and Development and Integrated Marketing Communications, working with clients such as Pfizer, MetLife, Saks Fifth Avenue, Marriott and ADP.

David’s book, Career Intensity: Business Strategy for Workplace Warriors and Entrepreneurs, shares techniques that seasoned professionals have developed and refined over the course of their careers.

Career Intensity makes the rules of career management and business success accessible to newer workers. If you have not achieved the success you were hoping for, it’s the perfect resource to jumpstart your career. The Smart Lemming recently interviewed David about avoiding big career mistakes, using marketing tools to generate buzz in job searches and managing personal brands.

SMART LEMMING: What is the single biggest career management mistake a person can make?
DAVID LORENZO: The biggest mistake anyone can make in their career is to take a job they do not feel good about just because it pays a lot of money.

The most important thing I have learned about success and work is that money can follow passion but passion rarely follows money.

It is far easier to make money than it is to find something you love.

SL: What’s the single biggest mistake a person can make as they go about a normal day at work?
DL: Well, that’s a tough question. Certainly punching your boss in the mouth would be a bad mistake. Also, taking home the office petty cash fund is never a good idea.

Seriously, big mistakes happen but they are generally preventable if you bring your commonsense with you to work.

The mistakes that most people make that hurt their career are the LITTLE mistakes. Things like:
Failure to give 100% effort to every task - no matter how small.
Not following up on requests from coworkers or customers.
Participating in office gossip.

These three things (and there are probably a dozen more just like them) will slowly kill your reputation in your company.

SL: You spent significant energy in the book teaching tools and frameworks so the reader can learn to overcome issues that may be holding them back in achieving career goals. Why did you choose specific frameworks like the five irrational fears, the five factors that influence strategic thinking, the eight steps to manage your emotions, or the 3-9-27 pyramid for this book?
DL: I view Career Intensity as a reference book.

I wanted each of the areas I discussed in the book to be able to “stand alone”. My hope is that people will return to specific parts of the book when they need some guidance in a specific area.

SL: Do careerists have enough self awareness? Are careerists hoping their current approach will make them successful in their business and career goals?
DL: Most people don’t plan.

Let’s face it; most people have a difficult time following a map to help them get from point “A” to point “B” why should we expect them to put a plan in place for their career?

In reality, people can’t often plan their career because they don’t have a solid understanding of what they want. This primarily stems from not seeing how they can turn their interests – their passion – into a career.

In most cases it takes a traumatic event – like getting fired – to shake people up enough to be introspective.

SL: David, you’re the expert on personal branding. How can someone adapt the funnel (advertising, tradeshows/networking, public relations, seminars/web presence, direct mail/email, and word of mouth) to a job search?
DL: Wow. That’s another question that requires a long and detailed answer. Rather than provide you with a detailed dissertation, let me give you a small example that demonstrates my thinking in this area: Every job-seeker should have a web site with a unique domain name. It’s inexpensive and easy to develop a simple two-three page website.

In addition, every job-seeker should have a personalized e-mail address at that domain name. For example: John@JohnSmith.com. This is part of personal branding.

This differentiates you from everyone else. It also makes you memorable.

Next: Get a toll free number. Again – not expensive. Make sure the letters spell something that differentiates you (like your name). You can have the toll free number ring to your cell phone or to your home phone. My toll free number is 1-888-D-Lorenzo (I know there is an extra letter on the end but if you dial it you will still get me).

These two ideas (web and toll free number) will cost you less than $20 per month.

As far as the other aspects of the funnel: We all need to view a job search as a direct marketing campaign. Everything we do should be measurable and each piece of the campaign should evoke action on the part of the target.

Marketing is war and we should adopt a “take no prisoners” approach toward a job search because it is the ultimate marketing campaign.

SL: In your book, you explain why workers must realize that they are living and breathing their personal brand with every interaction they have with coworkers or their boss. What are the common mistakes people make as they manage or mismanage their personal brand?
DL: I’d have to go back to self-promotion – like the website, e-mail and phone number. You have to help yourself become known.If you don’t do it, nobody else will.

SL: I liked the chapter on generating buzz, especially how you applied it to work situations. Any suggestions how someone could generate buzz if they are job searching?
DL: Get famous! Write articles in an area where you have expertise. You can use a graduate student (English Major) from a local university to help you edit your work if you are not comfortable writing.

Once you have the articles written, start pitching them to local publications and trade journals. Use e-mail to pitch the editors/publishers.

At a minimum set up a blog and post your articles on it. Link the blog to your website.

Give talks in your area of expertise in front of any group who will listen. This will help you build your reputation in your community.

SL: What career management advice would you give someone, who is in the first or second year of their career?
DL: Let’s get back to passion.

In the first couple of years of your career you need to build experience. Get experience in an area that you love – or at least enjoy.

Don’t become an engineer just because your dad was an engineer. Or worse: Don’t become an engineer because your dad told you to become an engineer. Become an engineer because you love the detail involved in engineering.

SL: What has the response been to your book? Anything about the response that has surprised you?
DL: Career Intensity has done well. Sales continue to be strong with over 1,000 flying out of the book stores each month.

SL: What are you working on now?
DL: I still work with The Gallup Organization – helping large companies with Human Capital issues.

I also started my own coaching program for Entrepreneurs and Small Businesses – based in Miami, FL. We started this project just recently and the demand has been phenomenal.

Finally, I’m in final editing for my next book – Sales Intensity: The Rainmaker’s Guide to Winning the Heart and Mind of Every Client.


Related Posts
“4 Steps to a Great Elevator Speech by Dave Lorenzo at Career Intensity“
“5 Secrets your boss doesn’t want you to know by David Lorenzo“
“The Parking Lot 02.23.2007 - Are you in a Career Rut?”
“Dave Lorenzo’s Five Benefits of Working with a Business Coach“
Smart Lemming Chronicles - “Career Intensity,” “Coolhunting,” “Science of Success,” and “Watch This, Listen Up, Click Here”
“The Trouble with Career Development Books, except “Career Intensity” by David Lorenzo“

Posts from Additional Bloggers on “Career Intensity”
“Book review: Career Intensity” by Bren, SlackerManager.com
“Quintessential Reading: Career Intensity” by Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D., Quintcareers.com
“Book Review – Career Intensity” by Lisa Haneberg, ManagementCraft.com

Blaming Mr. Rogers for Young Adults Feeling Entitled? That’s Just Ridiculous.
July 6th, 2007

I read “Why Young Adults Feel So Entitled” by Jeff Zaslow in the July 5th issue of the Wall Street Journal. I read the most ridiculous excuse on why young adults are “entitled.” According to Don Chance, a finance professor at Louisiana State University, “They [Chance’s students] felt so entitled,” Chance recalls, “and it just hit me. We can blame Mr. Rogers.”

Really? Blame Mr. Rogers? Come on! Where do parents fit in? This is a big leap in assuming why there’s a sense of entitlement among the college age population. Zaslow’s article was most likely prompted by the Associated Press’ press release titled, “Why young adults feel so entitled.” Here’s an excerpt by the Associated Press on the issue:

Fred Rogers, the late TV icon, told several generations of children that they were “special” just for being whoever they were. He meant well, and he was a sterling role model in many ways. But what often got lost in his self-esteem-building patter was the idea that being special comes from working hard and having high expectations for yourself.

Now Mr. Rogers, like Dr. Spock before him, has been targeted for re-evaluation. And he’s not the only one. As educators and researchers struggle to define the new parameters of parenting, circa 2007, some are revisiting the language of child ego-boosting. What are the downsides of telling kids they’re special? Is it a mistake to have children call us by our first names? When we focus all conversations on our children’s lives, are we denying them the insights found when adults talk about adult things?

This notion is one of the silliest things I’ve ever heard. Personally, I grew up on Mr. Rogers. And I don’t feel entitled. I didn’t ask for special favors or even call adults by the first names as a child. My parents were the primary reason for why I believe in working hard. I learned that feeling special resulted from working hard, not because Mr. Rogers told me that “I was special.” I remember feeling good about myself when Mr. Rogers said that I should feel good about myself, but that’s all.

Zaslow continues his article by mentioning, “Signs of narcissism among college students have been rising for 25 years, according to a recent study led by a San Diego State University psychologist. Obviously, Mr. Rogers alone can’t be blamed for this. But as Prof. Chance sees it, “he’s representative of a culture of excessive doting.” At least, this study is pointing in the right direction, perhaps at the parents, rather than Mr. Rogers or even Sesame Street?

Here’s a radical idea: someone should do a longitudinal study comparing a large sample of Mr. Rogers viewers to non-Mr. Rogers viewers over a twenty-year time period, so they can discover if Mr. Rogers really is to blame for this sense of entitlement. Until this study is done, I recommend we leave the memory of Mr. Rogers alone. Is he really the reason why young adults believe they should get special favors? I doubt it. How you can you blame anyone who was kind enough to tell children, “You know, you don’t have to look like everybody else to be acceptable and to feel acceptable.”


http://www.smartlemming.com/blog/

How to Set and Achieve a Giant, Life Changing Goal in 4 Simple Steps

Have you ever dreamed of doing something big? I’m talkin’ moon-shot big, Eiffel Tower big, set-the-world-on-fire big: a firestorm of accomplishment, racing over the dry kindling of the world; a powder-keg of success, detonating like a star in the night sky.

If you’ve ever had a big dream, let’s talk. Because the simple, 4-step process I’m about to lay on you can help you set and achieve the most ambitious goals imaginable.

Why Set Ambitious Goals?

The surest way to change your life is to accomplish something big. Big is relative, of course. One man’s big might include earning a high school diploma, while another’s might include directing a blockbuster movie. The question is not whether the world thinks your goal is ambitious, but whether you do; your life is the one affected.

And that’s the point — big goals are transformative. Earning a college degree transformed my professional life and earning power. Switching careers (from radio to software) transformed the way I think. Rapidly climbing the corporate ladder transformed my self-image.

Ambitious goals force growth, positive change, and transformation. By setting and achieving ambitious goals, we unearth our capacities, realize our potential, and take one step closer to living the life of our dreams.

Step 1: Decide what you Want

Why did the United States race to put a man on the moon? Why do engineers continue to design longer bridges and taller buildings? Why did Michelangelo carve the figure of David from a slab of Carrera Marble?

Each of the preceding examples has its own story, but if you pull back the layers of patriotism, politics, money, ego, and all the rest, you’ll find straightforward causation that applies to these grand achievements as equally as it applies to yours: Someone cared enough to make these things happen.
What do you care about?
What are you willing to sacrifice for?
How do you want to change?
What do you want to do?

Big, ambitious goals require energy, stoked in the furnace of passion. In other words, the first step in realizing a dream is finding a dream worth having.

Step 2: One Last Look before the Plunge

Once you’ve selected your goal (whether your goal involves becoming a rocket scientist or a rock star), additional research on cost versus benefit can ensure you’ve got what it takes before you jump:
What will life be like after the accomplishment?(Include quantifiable factors, such as salary and status, and emotional factors, such as freedom and pride).
What investment is required? (Include time, money, energy, and other forms of sacrifice.)
What’s the chance of success? (Is success a matter of hard work, luck, or both?)

Once you’ve plowed through the library stacks, badgered your associates, and knocked down every avenue of research to paint a realistic picture of what you’re getting into, you can make an informed decision about whether you’re ready to commit.

And that’s really what we’re talking about here: commitment. Do the research. Make sure you’re ready. Then commit. The road ahead requires it.

Step 3: The Glorious Battle Plan

Putting a man on the moon, building the world’s tallest building, and carving David all required planning. That big slab of marble didn’t end up in Michelangelo’s workshop by accident, nor did Apollo 11 magically appear on the lunar surface.

Ambitious goals often require equally ambitious battle plans.

Although it’s neither possible nor beneficial to document every task required to reach your goal, do document every task you can think of. Consider the following:
Training: Does your goal require an academic degree, self-study, or informal instruction?
Preparation: Does your goal require resource gathering?
Implementation: What tasks are required to achieve the dream?
Re-planning: If your goal is a long-term proposition, include periodic re-evaluation of the plan to ensure you’re on the right track.

For each task on your plan, estimate duration to clarify how long things will take and to foster a sense of immediacy. Include costs to solidify your budget.

A realistic plan is important for so many reasons: it clarifies the difficult first step, guides your way, breaks complicated tasks into more manageable pieces, and reveals your mission’s duration, cost, and scope.

Step 4: Frame of Mind and the Long Walk

Okay, so you’ve chosen a motivational goal of mythic proportions, plunged over the precipice, and adopted a decisive battle plan. Now what?

Now comes the long, hard trek. Anything worth having is hard work: earning a degree, changing careers, learning to play an instrument, starting a business.

After all, there’s no way to get from here to there without taking all the little steps inbetween. But you should already know what you’ve gotten yourself into – that’s why you did all that pre-work, right?

So now your success depends upon your ability to execute your plan, which in turn depends largely upon your frame of mind. As you hike up the mountain of success, keep these positive affirmations top of mind:

You can do it: Self-doubt and personal loathing are two of the biggest obstacles standing between you and your ambitious goal. Knock them out by reminding yourself how capable you truly are.

Rome wasn’t built in a day: Focus on putting one foot in front of the other and working your plan one task at a time instead of focusing on the size of the mountain you’re trying to climb.

Eye on the prize: Keep reminding yourself why all this hard work matters.
Process orientation: If the path before you seems too long to walk, try extracting joy from the process of each individual task.

Just as Michelangelo carved David from a slab of marble, you can carve your dreams from the monolith of life. Ready your chisel, decide what to carve, and plan your strokes.

The rest is just a matter of putting tool to stone and keeping the right frame of mind as your work of art unfolds beneath your hands.

Trickle-Up Leadership

"If people are too intimidated or too reluctant to help their leaders lead, their leaders will fail," says Michael Useem, the author of a new book about how you can take control -- even when you're not in command.
From: Issue 52 | October 2001 | Page 70 | By: Bill Breen

In a tough business climate -- and even in boom times, for that matter -- it's only natural to want to trust the people in the executive suite. After all, they know what they're doing, right? Not so fast, says Michael Useem in Leading Up: How to Lead Your Boss So You Both Win, due out this month from Crown Business. Sometimes, even the people upstairs need help. "If people are afraid to help their leaders lead, their leaders will fail," says Useem, a professor of management at the Wharton School and the director of its Center for Leadership and Change Management. In an interview with Fast Company, Useem talked about how to take control even when you're not in command.
It's up to each of us to lead our leaders.

As technology evolves and organizations decentralize, people on the front lines have far more independence and responsibility. They are closer to the market and closer to how their product is used. They can see what their leaders are missing. When leaders falter, it's up to the rest of us to step up and help them lead. But leading up is not some noble calling: When you help those above you avoid a bad deal or seize an opportunity, you improve your whole organization's performance.
You've got to speak up to lead up.

In the Marines, the ultimate command-and-control institution, if their superior issues a flawed order, officers are expected to point out the flaws before that order goes into effect. That's the example set by Peter Pace, commander in chief at the U.S. Southern Command in Miami. A four-star general like Pace is an intimidating, big-deal guy. But Pace never ends a meeting without asking his subordinates to tell him what they each think. By challenging them to challenge him, Pace reinforces a culture where everyone is inspired to lead up.
Before you lead up, you've got to team up.

Leading up is riskier in down times. You get close to that CSM point -- the Career Shortening Move -- when you challenge a boss at a time when people are being laid off. David Pottruck, the number-two executive for Charles Schwab Corp., learned this the hard way. When he was president of Schwab's operating company, Pottruck frequently clashed with his boss, Larry Stupski, at top-management meetings. Whatever Stupski proposed, Pottruck tended to oppose. The result was that most of the other executives sided with Stupski, the senior of the two.

Pottruck made two big mistakes: He failed to recruit other people to his cause, and he disagreed disagreeably. He was arguing up instead of leading up, and he was almost forced out of the company. But then he met with Stupski and proposed a solution: He would never publicly argue with him again. He might disagree, but he would do so only in private. In the months that followed, Pottruck learned a critical lesson: By questioning his boss behind closed doors only, he got his ideas into the room and kept the power struggle out of it.
Try to be all things to everybody, and you'll be nothing to anybody.

Many of us report to more than one project leader, and that represents a difficult challenge: How do you meet the demands of multiple managers who often disagree with one another? General Pace reported to no fewer than six immediate superiors. His solution was to follow a policy of full disclosure. He informed each of his bosses of what he was recommending to the others -- especially when he knew that one of those higher-ups would disagree with the recommendation. A case in point: when Wesley Clark, the European commander in chief, wanted U.S. Marine troops in the Balkans. Pace thought it was a bad idea. He was quick to tell Clark: "If you want them, they're yours. But when the Pentagon asks what I think, I'll oppose your plan for the following reasons."

That's a tough message to deliver. But Pace knew that by preemptively disclosing his disagreement with Clark, he was boosting his own credibility. His superiors could be confident that Pace would speak truth to power. Leaders don't have confidence in yes-men.

Which company has done the most to embrace the concept of upward leadership? The answer, says management professor Michael Useem, is General Electric. "GE has an extremely hard-hitting culture," says Useem. "But everyone is expected to challenge their leaders, even if it means challenging Jack Welch himself." To encourage its people to lead up, GE launched a program for mentoring up.

For many years, GE had required veteran leaders to mentor the next generation of top talent. But two years ago, when Welch realized that the Web would change everything, he asked 600 of his worldwide executives to reach down into the ranks and pick younger, Webified people to teach them the ways of the Net.

In his new book, Leading Up, Useem quotes Welch: "E-business knowledge is generally inversely proportional to both age and height in the organization." Mentoring up, Welch says, was intended to "change that equilibrium." Welch himself led the charge by picking Pam Wickham, who ran GE's main Web site, to be his Net coach.

The one-on-one sessions did more than give executives a crash course on the Web. They demonstrated that leadership is a two-way street: "Mid-level managers reported that they had become more comfortable in feeding ideas upstairs and pressing their bosses to change," writes Useem. "Top-level managers reported they had become more comfortable in eliciting insights from below." Bottom line: Reverse mentoring gets people to challenge their leaders -- and it helps leaders do a better job of leading.

Contact Michael Useem by email (useem@wharton.upenn.edu).
Sidebar: Mentoring Up

Which company has done the most to embrace the concept of upward leadership? The answer, says management professor Michael Useem, is General Electric. "GE has an extremely hard-hitting culture," says Useem. "But everyone is expected to challenge their leaders, even if it means challenging Jack Welch himself." To encourage its people to lead up, GE launched a program for mentoring up.

For many years, GE had required veteran leaders to mentor the next generation of top talent. But two years ago, when Welch realized that the Web would change everything, he asked 600 of his worldwide executives to reach down into the ranks and pick younger, Webified people to teach them the ways of the Net.

In his new book, Leading Up, Useem quotes Welch: "E-business knowledge is generally inversely proportional to both age and height in the organization." Mentoring up, Welch says, was intended to "change that equilibrium." Welch himself led the charge by picking Pam Wickham, who ran GE's main Web site, to be his Net coach.

The one-on-one sessions did more than give executives a crash course on the Web. They demonstrated that leadership is a two-way street: "Mid-level managers reported that they had become more comfortable in feeding ideas upstairs and pressing their bosses to change," writes Useem. "Top-level managers reported they had become more comfortable in eliciting insights from below." Bottom line: Reverse mentoring gets people to challenge their leaders -- and it helps leaders do a better job of leading.


Copyright © 2007 Mansueto Ventures LLC. All rights reserved.
Fast Company, 7 World Trade Center, New York, NY 10007-2195

Just Because There's a Winner, Doesn't Mean There Needs to Be a Loser

There are four ways a sale can end.

Win-Lose. You win and your customer loses. This could be a situation where your solution delivers less than the desired results.

Lose-Lose. Both you and your customer lose. Not a common scenario, but it does happen.

Lose-Win. You lose and your customer wins. A discount given to try to win future business can be a slippery slope if expectations are not managed properly.

Win-Win. The ideal end result of any sale is a win-win because it is the best way to ensure long-term business.

Not to say that you can't manage your way to Win-Win from one of the other options, but it is always the best choice to start with Win-Win as the goal.


Four Goals for Win-Win
When planning for a Win-Win solution, consider these four basic goals.

Don't oversell on expectations. Don't over promise so you're forced to under deliver. Be straight with your customer from the start. This is in your own best interest as well as the customer's because if you oversell at the beginning, both of you will be undersold in the end.

Don't get suckered into a giveaway. Don't be so eager to get a particular piece of business that you forget what you're in business for: to satisfy your customers and yourself. One without the other won't do.

Hear the customer out. Don't assume you know what she is thinking about and what you're trying to do for her company. Let your customer talk. That's the only way you can be sure of getting the information you need to facilitate her natural thought process and manage the sale toward a Win-Win situation.

Be willing to walk. Be willing to let a piece of business go if it's clear you can only get it if somebody loses.


Four Ways to Assess Your Win-Win Position
Pick two or three of your upcoming sales calls and assess your current position by asking yourself four questions:

Am I firmly committed to finding a fit between my product or service and what this customer actually needs? In other words, do I want her to win?

Does this person fully understand that I want her to win? What evidence do I have that she believes this?

Is this person clearly committed to having me win as well or is she aiming for a good deal at my expense?

Have I made it clear to the customer that she must share the responsibility for making the sale come out Win-Win?


Ask these questions as a reality check to understand your current position with each of your customers or prospects. If it helps, write down brief notes about each customer. Anything that makes your position more defined to you works to your long-term advantage in maintaining a Win-Win relationship.

You can always call us at 877-678-3380 and we'll be happy to chat with you about negotiating for a Win-Win. If outside North America, please call +44 (0)1908 211212.

Purpose
by Bob Proctor

Do you have a definite purpose that guides your ambitions, vision, and goals?

"What a different story people would have to tell if they would adopt a definite purpose and stand by that purpose until it had time to become an all-consuming purpose." -- Napoleon Hill, Laws of Success

It doesn't matter how you think you arrived here on this planet or under whose direction - the fact remains that each of us has specific talents and gifts that are uniquely coded within our own DNA.

As you go through life, you don't just pick up things you like doing by chance. You discover what you're good at because you were meant to discover it, just as you were meant to figure out what your fingers do, and how your elbows work. Your unique gifts are hardwired into your system just as surely as your lungs are given their blueprint to breathe.

And it's from these specific talents and gifts that you're able to define and determine your definite purpose. the reason why you're here. What's in you cannot be found in another living human being. In fact, it's quite possible that what you bring to the table hasn't been duplicated - ever - since time began.

That's right! This "purpose" is serious business.

If you fail to determine your definite purpose, everything else is wrong. It's like working with a broken compass - you may think you're going North, but you're not. You're not sure which direction you're heading, so, you're just wandering aimlessly.

Without your purpose identified firmly in your mind, you will wander through life, never quite feeling that you're "in the flow." I say, then, that it's imperative you recognize what it is you're good at - what it is you really love to do. Your purpose in this lifetime is to do the thing that you love.

People will tell you they already know what they're good at, and what they love to do most, but they'll never earn money doing it. Whoever gave you THAT idea? When you're sorting out your purpose, I don't want you thinking about THAT non-issue at all. You can earn money at ANYTHING. Once you determine your purpose, you won't even have to think hard on HOW to earn money - it's as if you're being guided by an unseen hand, heading in the right direction. and everything falls into place.

The key to your life is not that you settle for the "safe" thing that will bring in the money. The key is to turn and do what you really love. Fall in love with an idea. That's your life! That's your purpose.

Fall In Love With An Idea

More often than not, when we think of "love," we tend to think of two human beings in love. When they're in love, they enjoy the same ideas; their feelings are in harmony.
Love is resonance. Love occurs when two entities are on the same frequency.
So, when a person falls in love with an idea, his conscious and subconscious are resonating. they're in sync. And, it's what's going on in the mind that dictates the vibration of the body and moves the body into action. So, you must first allow yourself to fall in love with an idea . what is it you really love to do?

The psychologist Alfred Adler once said, "I am grateful for the idea that has used me." When you fall in love with an idea, it guides you. you don't guide it anymore.

Nor are you going to find yourself digging around for ambition or seeking to achieve your purpose. It'll push you out of bed in the morning long before your alarm clock considers doing the same. When you land on your purpose and truly start doing what you love, it's like being 12-years-old again, waking up to your first glorious day of summer vacation. What might have been drudgery for you just a day before is now grand opportunity and discovery.
You're loaded with ambition.

Did the weather change?

Did the sun rise several hours sooner?

Of course not. The only entity that changed between the last day of school and the first day of summer vacation was YOU. In similar fashion, acting on your purpose pushes your ambition through the ROOF. The gifts within you were programmed to SING in a spotlight on center stage! Ambition is the talent agent that promotes these gifts and believes in your gifts to get them to that stage. The performance you do from that stage. that's your life's purpose.

Bob Proctor

 

Apple among the IDEAL Employers

Posted by Dennis Sellers May 3, 2007 at 3:38pm

What are some of the ideal places to work? Google, Apple, Toyota, and Starbucks among others, according to the findings of the Universum IDEAL Employer Survey- MBA Edition 2007, which was conducted by Universum, a global employer branding company. 5,451 MBA students participated in the MBA Edition of The Universum IDEAL Employer Survey, making it the largest survey of its kind.

Students were asked to rank their IDEAL Employers as well, as to answer questions about their career expectations, including IDEAL Employer characteristics, preferred location, salary expectations, top industries and best internships communications preferences.

Google is now the most popular place to work for MBA students after jumping from 129th in 2005 to second in 2006 and to number one this year ending McKinsey & Company’s 12-year reign. Google also appears in the top ten in all industry rankings (from investment banking to healthcare).

Despite Google’s new strength as the overall IDEAL employer, McKinsey is still the top employer among men MBAs. Goldman Sachs (number three) maintained its position in the top 10. Bain & Co. (four), BCG (five), Apple (six), Microsoft (seven), GE (eight), Nike (nine) and Bank of America (10) round out the list.

GE is still the top choice among MBA students who selected engineering/manufacturing followed by Toyota, Apple, J&J and BCG. Intel, number two in 2006, fell 15 positions while companies like Honeywell and Boeing pushed up in the top 10.

McKinsey maintains its number one position as the top employer in management consulting. Google jumped to the fourth position, preceded by BCG and Bain & Company. Goldman Sachs still tops among students choosing a career in investment banking followed by Morgan Stanley, Lehman Brothers, JPMorgan IB and Merrill Lynch. Bank of America replaced Citigroup as the number one IDEAL employer among MBA students interested in commercial banking.

IT companies went up overall. Google maintained its top ranking. Apple (six) moved up from seventh position in 2006, while Microsoft (seven) jumped from the 16th position.

Procter & Gamble, Google, PepsiCo, Nike and BCG make the top five for students interested in consumer goods. Starbucks pushed up eight positions from 15th to seventh.

Key Employees

By Mike Myatt, Chief Strategy Officer, N2growth

Much has been written on the subject of retaining key employees and in my opinion most of it flat misses the mark. In fact, I’ll go so far to say that key employees are not assets but rather large contingent liabilities. If you have stooped to the level of paying retention bonuses or find yourself otherwise being held hostage by those employees who feel like they are indispensable you are only exacerbating the problem. I’m not disputing the need to retain talent and reduce turnover but I am vehemently disputing the conventional wisdom of how most businesses address the risk of managing key employees. In today’s post I’ll give you a fresh perspective on the age old dilemma of how to deal with key employees…

As a CEO or entrepreneur your problem with key employees begins the very second you publicly identify someone as such. The fact that you have a key employee to begin with means that at a minimum you have a lack of transparency and continuity in your organization and more probably that you lack depth of talent and are weak in process and knowledge management.

How would you answer this question…Is your company talent poor and key employee dependant or talent rich or key employee independent? In my book a superstar is not necessarily the same thing as a key employee…There is a monumental difference between real tier-one talent and a primadonna who thinks of themselves as tier-one talent. Employees who represent true tier-one talent see themselves as part of the team seeking to make those around them more successful. Contrast this with those primadonnas who are interested solely in their own success without regard to those around them. Any company that bestows a primadonna with recognition as a key employee is a company about ready to experience a completely avoidable disaster.

Over the years I have learned that no one and I mean no one is indispensable. A well managed company is not dependant upon the performance of any single individual. Those individuals who attempt to hoard knowledge, relationships or resources to attain job security are not to be valued as key, but are to be admonished as ineffective and deemed a liability. Corporate talent that cannot be shared, duplicated, distributed or leveraged is not nearly as valuable as talent that can.

If you want to eliminate dependency on key employees don’t allow any individual to create ultimate domain over anything that is considered key or mission critical. Instead create a culture that values transparency, knowledge management, mentoring, coaching and process. By doing these things you will add both depth and breadth to your organization and increase the overall level of talent across the enterprise.

What’s the best way to build your brand?

By Mike Myatt, Chief Strategy Officer, N2growth

Assuming that you have deep pockets and a lot of patience, growing a recognized brand isn’t difficult…spend heavily across all mediums with consistent, creative, on message advertising while simultaneously conducting an aggressive public relations campaign. Avoid controversy, maintain a high likeability factor, be a business of character that engenders trust and confidence on the part of your target market(s), produce a quality product or service at a competitive price point and provide great customer service.

The description above paints the perfect illustration of why branding is one of my favorite topics…It is complex. While the illustration above is true in every sense, unless you are a very large enterprise it is unlikely that you have the time, money, staffing or external professional relationships to execute a brand management strategy such as the one outlined above.

So what’s the best way to build a brand if you’re not a Fortune 500 company? Be very, very smart…Unfortunately I’m not kidding. If your business isn’t one of the deep pocketed companies capable of executing a strategy like the one mentioned above then you must understand how to cost effectively appropriate and deploy resources and talent, as well as apply leverage, velocity and economies of scale to your particular company and its corresponding market in a manner that still produces results. The simple truth of the matter is that building brand equity with limited resources is one of the most difficult things to accomplish in the business world.

The following items constitute the basic tenants of branding, which if incorporated into your brand management strategy will help build a solid brand regardless of the size of your company or your ad budget:

1. Treat your brand as an asset not an afterthought…If building brand equity is not a key strategic focus for your executive team don’t be surprised if your brand remains in stealth mode;

2. Never sacrifice quality…Your products, services, leadership, management, culture, customer service, communication, etc. must all reflect high standards of quality. Quality equals value in the eyes of the consumer and as a result often corresponds into justifying price premiums;

3. Know your market…make sure you understand the needs and desires of you customers/clients and do everything possible to satisfy them.

4. Understand the competition…Creating competitive separation is a must. Without strong and clearly recognized competitive value propositions you will forced into the commodity market of competing on price points alone.

5. Choose the right mediums…If you don’t have the luxury of being able to spend across mediums select the medium that will give the most frequency and reach at the lowest cost. Put simply spend your money where you get the biggest bang for the buck, and;

6. Be consistent…Consistency in all things and throughout the value chain is critical. Continuity should flow from vision to mission to strategy, to tactics to process. Mixed messaging or practices has killed many a brand.

If you’re looking for more detailed information on the subject of branding please download our branding white paper.

Leaders vs. Managers

By Mike Myatt, Chief Strategy Officer, N2growth

There has been a lot of politically correct pontificating of late in corporate circles about the differences between managers and leaders. Most of the commentary I have read attempts to please both audiences. Those of you who have read my work in the past know that I am rarely politically correct nor do I ever seek to try and please all the people all the time.

While there is clearly a need for both managers and leaders in the business world and while I respect and have developed close friendships with many a manager, this author simply believes that the law of scarcity applies to the topic at hand. There is an infinitely greater supply of managers causing a much greater demand for leaders. Put simply, because leaders are much more difficult to come by, they are therefore more valuable to an enterprise.

The paragraph above begs the question why are there fewer leaders than managers? I believe it is because not everyone has it in them to be a leader and thus the old axiom “a born leader”. The intrinsic quality of leadership often begins with nothing more than raw talent and a certain state of mind. To possess the innate qualities of a leader is however not the same thing as being a leader. As important as your DNA is, effective leadership skills are developed and refined by time, experience, and a true desire to be more than just a manager, but a true leader.

Let’s breakdown the DNA of a typical leader…A leader is usually a very creative, dynamic, outgoing and unflappable individual. They tend to think big picture focusing on vision and strategy while looking to make a long-term impact. By way of contrast let’s examine the DNA of a manager. Managers are usually more analytical while focusing on process and procedure looking to make short-term contributions. The following list adapted from Mind of a Manager, Soul of a Leader by Craig Hickman, John Wiley & Sons, demonstrates the DNA gap between leaders and managers:

Managers build systems and procedures, Leaders build teams and develop talent.

Managers surround themselves with subordinates & Leaders surround themselves with the best & brightest.

Managers avoid risk and Leaders thrive on risk.

Managers find comfort in the status quo & Leaders serve as a catalyst for change & growth.

Managers settle for industry standard & Leaders demand the best.

Managers wield power while Leaders apply influence.

Managers control & Leaders inspire.

Managers formulate policy & Leaders set examples.

Managers instruct…Leaders mentor.

Managers are reactive while Leaders are proactive.

Managers plan…Leaders innovate.

Managers refine…Leaders revolutionize.

Managers reorganize…Leaders reinvent.

Managers pursue the tangible while Leaders seek the intangible.

We have all witnessed companies that have been over managed in the absence of leadership. When leadership has been abdicated to management in a corporate setting you will always find that growth slows, morale declines, creativity wanes and the competitive edge is weakened. That being said, I have personally experienced the value of true leadership at every stage of my life from the athletic playing field, to the military battleground to the corporate boardroom. Let’s look at an example of the value of leadership from each of the three areas:

• An example from the world of athletics…If you were the owner of an NFL franchise and had to choose between having the #1 quarterback in the league or the #1 center in league what would your choice be? Again this doesn’t mean that a great center isn’t valuable, it just means that the role player isn’t as valuable to the team as having the talent factor and leadership characteristics of a true impact player. Simply reflect back upon your own life experiences and you’ll see that you have come across many utility players over the years, but very few franchise players.

• A military example…Contrast if you will the differences of two enlisted men of the same rank. The first is a sergeant in a headquarters unit charged with the administrative support of a company commander. The second sergeant is a combat controller in a special operations unit charged with coordinating air strikes from the ground behind enemy lines. While both of the enlisted men described above hold the same rank, are part of a team, and play important roles, one is clearly an impact player in a leadership capacity while the other is solely a utility player acting in a management capacity. The military has determined that it is a rare individual who exhibits the characteristics necessary to become a member of a special operations unit. Therefore they are willing to make a much larger investment in the combat controller and in return the military expects a much larger contribution from that individual.

• A corporate example…This example will be short and sweet, but hopefully very clear in its statement of impact. Who do you believe is of greater value and makes a larger contribution to a corporation, someone who administers policy and creates processes or someone who sets the vision and creates the strategy? Just examine the difference in the pay stubs of the two individuals contrasted above and you’ll quickly see who the enterprise deems to be of higher value.

I want to be clear that I am not “anti” manager. I am however very “pro” leadership when it comes to optimizing the talent factor in any organization. My bias toward leadership doesn’t mean that I don’t understand the principles behind such truisms as: “there is no “I” in team” or, “the sum of the parts is greater than the whole” or that “a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.” Rather it simply means that I believe you achieve a much greater return on human capital with investments made into leadership due to the scope and scale of the impact that a leader can make. The bottom line is that I prefer to lead rather than manage and to be led rather than to be managed.

Innovation June 15, 2007, 10:52AM EST

 
Clayton Christensen's Innovation Brain
The landscape has changed in the 10 years since The Innovator's Dilemma, but it's still the seminal work on disruption

by Jena McGregor

Clayton Christensen is a giant in the world of innovation thinkers. And that's not just because the Harvard Business School professor stands 6 feet, 8 inches tall. Christensen's first book, The Innovator's Dilemma, became a bible for technology executives and Internet entrepreneurs not long after it was published 10 years ago. To date, it's sold 500,000 copies worldwide, while in 1999, Christensen was described by Forbes as "Andy Grove's Big Thinker" and featured on the magazine's cover with the former Intel chairman and Silicon Valley sage.

The book's theme—that good management is no guard against the disruptive power of new entrants who go after new customer groups or low-end markets—remains important today. "More than ever it has become shorthand for a classic problem," says Patrick Whitney, director of the Institute of Design at the Illinois Institute of Technology. "People never have to explain it, they just mention Clayton's name or The Innovator's Dilemma and everyone gets what the problem is."

Ten years later, however, the innovation landscape is rather different. Globalization has exponentially expanded where threats lie. Design thinking and its focus on the customer has captured the minds of managers. And as chief executives increasingly look to reinvent their business models, innovation is no longer defined in terms of mere technological breakthroughs. So how relevant is a book that chronicles the upending of the disk drive, steel, and earth excavator industries?

Ideas Still Resonate

Very, says Robert Sutton, professor of management science and engineering at the Stanford Engineering School and co-founder of Stanford's d.school. "There are very few books, whether you do innovation in the academic world or in the business world, that you have to understand equally well," he says. "You have to know it." In essence, the dilemma Christensen describes—how to serve your core business while finding new markets and watching out for new entrants in your blind spot—is as critical today as it was 10 years ago.

While reading it today can plunge you into a bit of a time warp—"Internet appliances," those devices for the kitchen counter that would only browse the Web and respond to e-mail, did not upend the PC industry—Christensen's ideas still resonate. Criticisms of the book tend to surround its lack of solutions, which Christensen tried to correct in his follow-up, The Innovator's Solution, which was published in 2003 to less fanfare.

One reason the first book was so well-received, says Roger Martin, the dean of the Joseph L. Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, is that Christensen doesn't criticize managers, as many ivory tower professors do in their books. Rather, a major theme is that great managers miss disruptive innovations precisely because they're focused on their customers, working hard to create returns for shareholders, and trying to do everything right.

"He takes a 'there but for the grace of god go you,' positive, blame-free approach [that managers both respond to and appreciate]," Martin says.

BusinessWeek Associate Editor Jena McGregor caught up with Christensen on June 11, exactly 10 years after the release of his book. Here are edited excerpts of their conversation:

Back in 1997, did you ever think the book would achieve the sort of popularity that it did?
I thought I had a good idea. It emerged from my doctoral thesis on the disk drive industry, and at the beginning I thought it applied a bit in computers and disk drives, but I didn't know how far it would reach. Then one by one people read the research and said this is "exactly what is happening in my industry." I really didn't understand that it was as generalized a phenomenon as it has turned out to be.

Your book focuses heavily on disruptions that are caused by advances in technology. More than ever, however, managers are defining "innovation" in a broader context, from breakthrough business processes to business models to customer experiences.
I think when I wrote The Innovator's Dilemma, my brain really was a technological brain and I was looking for a technological explanation. So I called it "disruptive technology." Then as I helped people to try and use the ideas, it became very clear there really isn't anything [it doesn't apply to]. Disruption really is a business model innovation. Most disruptions have a technological enabler that [allows] people to make simpler products that are more affordable and accessible for people. In The Innovator's Solution, I recanted. We called it disruptive innovation [rather than disruptive technology]. Basically I was wrong in labeling it a technological phenomenon.

In The Innovator's Dilemma you warn that the maxim "staying close to your customers" can lead you astray. Wouldn't a cursory reading of the book say "don't listen to your customers?"
You're exactly right. The cursory reading is "don't listen." The deep reading is you have to be careful which customers you listen to, and then you need to watch what they do, not listen to what they say. This is catching on with one of the big automobile companies in Detroit. If you look for the jobs that people hire a car to do, the opportunities for innovation are extraordinary.

There are about 30 million Americans for whom [a car] serves as their office. Isn't it interesting that nobody has designed a car to work as an office? They pull up to Starbucks (SBUX) and go in to use their T-Mobile hot spot or if they're in Silicon Valley they'll pull up next to someone's apartment building to mooch off their Wi-Fi because they can't access the Internet in their car.

They stop at a stoplight, their notebook computer falls onto the floor. They can't recharge their computer because the electrical system was not designed to do it and there's no docking station. They throw sales literature in the backseats. Nobody's designed a car to do that job. If you understand the job, the opportunities to differentiate are just extraordinary.

To do that, though, you do have to "stay close to your customers" to see what jobs they need. In a sense, they will lead you to the answer, not astray. Shouldn't Dilemma have been clearer on that, or expanded on that idea?
Yes. The problem is when you say "listen to your customers," your customers are only going to lead you in a direction that they want to go in. Generally, that will never lead you to disruptive growth. You've got to find that new set of customers, and listen to them and follow them. That's the trick. Once you have customers, they hold you captive to their needs.

Your book also focused on entrants disrupting established players at the low end. What do you make of a company like Starbucks? Didn't it come in at the high end with its $3 lattes?
It's interesting. The principle, which is a lot clearer to me 10 years later, is that disruption is a relative phenomenon. What Starbucks did was to come into the middle of the market. They disrupted the sit-down restaurants. The job people hire Starbucks to do is to help them to sit down and have a conversation, have an informal meeting. Before Starbucks, you had to go to a restaurant to sit down and have lunch, which was a lot more expensive. Starbucks disrupted that. They made it affordable and simple for a lot of people to go in and have these discussions.

You've said "the most widespread and dangerous misunderstanding of the model is the equation of 'new' or 'breakthrough' with disruption." Yet today, I feel like "disruptive" has become just that: A synonym executives use when they're describing something big or bold. Why is that dangerous?
Because it causes them to think that, "I'll just take whatever hobby horse I have, because Clay's study showed that disruptive products create these new growth markets. I'll cause everyone to believe my idea's going to do that." In fact, big technological leapfrogs rarely create new growth. Almost all of them are defensive in character. The equation of disruptive with new and radical causes people to target markets that don't exist.


Andy Grove recognized this a lot sooner than I did. There are many prior connotations in the English language for the word disruption. He was worried that the word would be so misused that he called it "the Christensen effect" internally. The problem was I couldn't call it the Christensen effect. In retrospect, it would have made things a lot clearer had I found a word that didn't have so many other connotations. It gets hijacked.

I hear a lot of managers today talking about trying to create "innovators at all levels" and building innovation into every corner of a vast corporation. Is that a misguided idea? Isn't that contradictory to what you say in Dilemma, which is that disruption happens in "spin-out organizations," as you call them?
Generally you create a lot of hype. People come up with lots of new ideas, but nothing happens. They get very disillusioned. Never does an idea pop out of a person's head as a completely fleshed-out business plan. It has to go through a process that will get approved and funded. You're not two weeks into the process until you realize, "gosh, the sales force is not going to sell this thing," and you change the economics. Then two weeks later, marketing says they won't support it because it doesn't fit the brand, so we've got to change the whole concept.

All those forces act to make the idea conform to the company's existing business model, not to the marketplace. And that's the rub. So the senior managers today, thirsty for innovation, stand at the outlet of this pipe, see the dribbling out of me-too innovation after me-too innovation, and they scream up to the back end, "Hey, you guys, get more innovative! We need more and better innovative ideas!" But that's not the problem. The problem is this shaping process that conforms all these innovative ideas to the current business model of the company.

What are you working on today?
Two books that will be finished by this summer—one looking at the problems of why our health-care system is so expensive and inaccessible and [another looking at] why our public schools struggle to improve. Then I'm working on another project I think is really exciting [about] the misapplied and misleading methods of financial analysis. The core idea is many of the programs we teach are fundamentally biased against innovation. There are just a whole bunch of paradigms of financial analysis that really lie at the root cause of companies' under-investments in innovation.

As an example, discounted cash flow or net present value is the most commonly used method to determine what an innovation is worth today. But the mathematics have an implicit assumption within them that if we don't do this innovation, the way things are today will maintain themselves in the future. That's not true. The company's current financial condition will not persist. By comparing the innovation against the do-nothing scenario, you're biased.

Is there a better way?
There's a method that's the brainchild of Rita McGrath at Columbia and Ian Macmillan at Wharton called "discovery-driven planning." It's a much better way to assess the value of projects. Most companies, when they look at the financial projections [of a potential innovation project], if they look good, they do it. If they don't, they don't.

But the desirability of attractive numbers has never been an issue. Why shine the spotlight on the numbers? Rather, a better way to do it is: We all know how good the numbers need to look for this to be attractive. But what assumptions have to prove true in order for those numbers to materialize out of this innovation? So you focus the spotlight on what assumptions have to prove true, and you launch a project to test those assumptions. It's a much better way.

If you combine Rita's work with mine—that a disruption always creates market capitalization—and if one of the assumptions relates to what job customers need to do when they hire a company's product, the probability of success and of it being big can be assessed without even looking at numbers.

Who or what do you think will disrupt Google (GOOG) or Apple (AAPL)?
It's hard for me to see what will disrupt Google. I think they've got a pretty good run ahead of them. Chapters five and six of The Innovator's Solution describe how at the beginning phases of the industry, in order to play that game successfully you really need to have a proprietary, optimized, end-to-end architecture to your product.

Apple sure has that.
That's why they've been successful. But just watch the [competitors'] advertisements that you hear for the ability to download music onto your mobile phone. Music on the mobile phone has to be downloaded in an open architecture way from Yahoo! Music or someplace else [other than iTunes]. Which means it's clunkier, not as good. Mobile phones don't have as much storage capacity, nor are their interfaces as intuitive [as iPods]. But for some folks, they're good enough, and the trajectories [of people using their phone as a medium for listening to music] just keep getting better and better.

So music on the mobile phone is going to disrupt the iPod? But Apple's just about to launch the iPhone.
The iPhone is a sustaining technology relative to Nokia. In other words, Apple is leaping ahead on the sustaining curve [by building a better phone]. But the prediction of the theory would be that Apple won't succeed with the iPhone. They've launched an innovation that the existing players in the industry are heavily motivated to beat: It's not [truly] disruptive. History speaks pretty loudly on that, that the probability of success is going to be limited.

McGregor is BusinessWeek's management editor.

http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/jun2007/id20070615_198176.htm

Consulting: What's your challenge?

 
How can we create a Culture of Innovation?

One of the more frequent issues clients raise with us is the need to change organizational culture. Culture can be a critical barrier or a true enabler to innovation – it governs the hundreds of daily decisions that senior managers never get to make.

We believe that much of the conventional thinking about “creating” culture is deeply misguided. Culture is fundamentally a lagging variable, not a leading one. It is the result of a set of decisions, precedents, and supporting leadership behaviors around all aspects of organizational design including strategy, structure, people and processes.

Starting a transformation by focusing only on culture is superficial at best and most likely doomed for failure – somewhat akin to re-launching a failing automobile after changing only the brand. Worse, such efforts can ingrain cynicism about innovation into an organization, making it more difficult for subsequent efforts to move forward.

From our experience, culture can in fact change rapidly, but only if management aligns the “hard” aspects of organizational change – variables such as how:

Ideas are sourced
Opportunities are evaluated
Risk is measured
Success (and failure) are rewarded
Initiatives are staffed
Experiments are executed
Commercialization is organized
Learning is achieved

How we do it

Given the fallacies noted above, Innosight does not undertake engagements focused exclusively on culture. Rather, we make cultural change an integral part of our other work on organizational effectiveness. These kinds of engagements are typically undertaken while looking at sourcing, shaping, or commercializing actual innovation opportunities, as developing new behaviors with real projects tends to have far more impact than making abstract recommendations. Organizational issues we examine may include matters such as:

Front End Ideation: How does a firm find ideas and practice Open Innovation (a term coined by Berkeley Professor Henry Chesbrough) to bring in opportunities from the outside world? Recommended processes vary greatly depending upon the objectives of the firm and the types of innovation being sought.

Evaluation Process: How easy is it for an idea to get a first hearing? What’s “the process before the process?” What questions should managers ask, and when? Who should be vetting these ideas? What are metrics of success? How can more ideas be evaluated, and more ideas be killed?

Risk Assessment: Many firms have no good view of the risk in their development pipelines – its level, timing, correlation, and implications. Managers would insist on this sort of knowledge for their personal stock portfolios, but lack this information when it comes to their engine of future growth. Good risk assessment systems are not only rigorous, but are also easy to implement on an everyday basis, understandable, and flexible. They encourage risk-taking, if it’s risk-taking for a good reason. And they encourage ending doomed initiatives early, before too much money and time is wasted.

Rewards and Career Development: Rising stars typically do not want to be associated with failure, and yet truly innovative projects inherently run some risk of failing. Firms need to reward failure if it is failure for a good reason, in which learning has been achieved. The challenge lies in making that delineation without being unduly subjective. When success occurs, managers need to be rewarded and acknowledged, but the benefits cannot be so great as to inspire intense rivalry or huge numbers of staff to gravitate to winning teams.

Recruiting and Staffing: Is innovation everyone’s job, or just a few people’s? Who is to be staffed on project teams? What’s the right profile of a project leader? Answers depend on the context, and are sometimes counter-intuitive. For example, someone who is a superstar in the core business may be utterly unsuited to lead an innovation initiative if, for instance, their success has been fueled by extreme detail-orientation and laser-focus on a problem. Also, it can sometimes be advisable to staff a team with people you think might disagree vehemently – in the right situations, the best ideas can result from such tensions.

Organization: Frequently, companies find that they need to create a new department focused on finding out-of-the-box ideas and commercializing them. This does not call for large-scale re-organization of the firm, but does require an investment in establishing a repeatable capability to innovate. There are many ways in which such a business unit can be set up, and several options in how closely it can be linked back to the core.

Learning: All too often, struggling initiatives result in blame and scapegoating, rather than disciplined learning. Firms need to establish rigorous mechanisms to capture insights and recycle them into other efforts.

Regardless of the type of engagement, there are two additional variables that we view as critical for success in achieving cultural change:

Leadership: Leadership behaviors are an essential part of defining and reinforcing change. For this reason, we always suggest that senior leaders be involved in the projects that we undertake. Senior executives speak through megaphones – their everyday words and actions can have immense influence on the mindset of others in the firm.

Training & Coaching: Another important part of culture alignment is training and coaching to promote consistency of “soft” behaviors with the “hard” factors alluded to above. Innosight strongly believes in the power of education to supplement consulting in ensuring that culture change is deep and sustained. It is amazing how far ‘speaking a common language’ can go in terms of propelling an organization behind an initiative such as innovation.

Enacting cultural change is a challenge for any organization. However, we believe companies that define supporting elements around strategy, structure, people and processes and follow up with strong reinforcing signals from leadership can inspire an innovation culture in their organization.

http://www.innosight.com/how_culture.htm

Strategic Enterprise Business Services

Jeitosa’s Strategic Enterprise Business Services address the key components of any business endeavor -- Organization, People, Process, and Technology -- all of which are linked together and driven by the company’s Business Objectives. Our sphere model visually represents how these essential components function together smoothly and seamlessly to carry out any significant initiative. Jeitosa offers specific services across and within each of these areas to assist organizations where they have the greatest needs. Project Management and Change Management orbit the sphere, ensuring that all components are integrated and effectively managed.




Readiness Assessment

Jeitosa Group offers a Readiness Assessment service – both global and domestic – that evaluates an organization’s capacity, capability, and willingness to undertake a new initiative. Our assessment process evaluates each gear in your firm to determine the organization’s overall readiness for change. From enterprise objectives and organizational structure to the business processes, technology infrastructure, and people responsible for the new initiative, Jeitosa’s Readiness Assessment shows you where your organization is strong and where weaknesses may lie that can be targeted for development. We provide specific recommendations and guidance to help make sure your organization is ready for any new business endeavor.

Change Management

Jeitosa Group takes a “Whole Change” thinking approach to change management to help clients more effectively execute both small and large-scale change efforts within their organizations. Whole Change thinking looks at the implications of change both separately and together in order to see how the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Securing leadership buy-in and stakeholder commitment, our transformation and communication strategies take an integrated, rather than linear, approach to the change process, providing specific guidelines and recommendations to facilitate acceptance and assimilation along each step of the transformation process.

Project Management

All of Jeitosa’s experienced and certified project managers have decades of experience in managing small and medium-sized projects to large global deployment efforts. Our project management methodology encompasses the three broad activities of Planning, Scheduling, and Controlling, conducted in an iterative and integrative manner, with hands-on scope and issue resolution management performed throughout the entire process. From business process redesign, systems deployment, and shared services implementations to data privacy compliance and international regulatory audits, our project managers are experienced in managing the scope, time, and resources involved to ensure on-time, under budget, and above expectation delivery.
Organization

HRIT Strategy & Planning

Jeitosa Group associates help small-to-medium-sized businesses as well as Global Fortune 500 companies create an effective HRIT strategy and plan. We start with an assessment of your current situation, analyze your core competencies, strengths and weaknesses, work with you to develop a vision for the future, and then develop a comprehensive strategic plan that addresses the needs of your unique environment. Our extensive global experience helps in developing the right balance between the needs of local business units and the goals and standards required by corporate headquarters. Our approach, integrated with an actionable transition plan and project plan, creates a smooth, achievable, and measurable path to the organization’s desired future state.

Business Case and ROI Development

Jeitosa’s Business Case and ROI Development service helps organizations evaluate vendors and systems deployment options to address key business needs. A highly automated, structured process, our approach utilizes a proprietary database of benchmarks, metrics, and best practices accumulated over the past decade. Our ROI strategy encompasses a full total cost of ownership (TCO) and total economic impact (TEI) analysis to not only assess the current and projected cost impact but also to analyze the risks and flexibilities inherent in any potential solution that will help to better position the organization for the future.

Organization Design

Jeitosa Group associates are pioneers in helping organizations evolve their organization structures to one more in line with the firm’s strategic goals and plans. Our proven approach assures that the people, the processes, and the technology infrastructure are all fully aligned with the organization’s objectives. For global firms, we help organizations move to a transnational organization structure – one that balances the global needs of corporate headquarters with the local needs of in-country operations, and leverages innovation and learning from all corners of the organization.

Shared Services and Sourcing

Jeitosa has extensive experience in the design and deployment of Shared Services operations for Global Fortune 500 firms. From determining organizational readiness to developing the governance structure to planning and managing the implementation to auditing the effectiveness of a fully deployed Shared Services operation, we have proven tools, techniques, and methodologies that ensure a successful outcome. Our approach also comprises a multi-dimensional sourcing analysis to ensure that the organization is making the most effective and efficient use of available sourcing strategies (offshore, nearshore, inhouse, hosted, etc.).

M & A Integration

Most all organizations of any size today have grown not only organically, but also through mergers and acquisitions. Experts say that close to 70% of all acquisitions fail to achieve their objectives – and this is primarily due to a lack of effective cultural integration. Jeitosa takes a comprehensive and cohesive approach to helping organizations through the integration process of a merger or acquisition to ensure that the business processes (for human resources and finance), the people (from management to line workers), and the supporting technologies (both applications and infrastructure) are in place to effect a smooth transition and effective integration process.
Process

Process Optimization

Jeitosa offers a structured methodology to analyze, design, or redesign core business processes to deliver improved business results. Through a rapid, iterative prototyping approach – also called a Conference Room Pilot – we evaluate and analyze the organization’s current state and interactively define and design the new desired business state. We focus on integrating the organizational design, people aspects, and technology components into the optimized business processes to ensure a comprehensive and cohesive approach.

International Compliance

As more and more companies are operating on the global stage, compliance with local laws and regulations is becoming a paramount concern. Jeitosa’s hands-on depth and breath of experience with international HR issues, regulations, and business practices in the major countries around the world helps ensure companies are standardizing globally where possible and adhering to local laws and regulations where required. Our library of legal and regulatory requirements helps with conducting an international compliance audit and pointing out areas of concern where additional investigation may be required.

Global Data Privacy & Protection

Globalization brings a new set of requirements around employee data privacy, system security and compliance with national data protection laws and regulations. Jeitosa’s associates have decades of experience which help you address your data privacy and protection challenges in a comprehensive and cost-effective manner. Our services are structured to provide a step-by-step process to allow you to understand the issues, determine a course of action, and carry out solutions to ensure you achieve and remain in compliance. Our flexible methodology is scalable to meet the requirements of small-to-medium-sized businesses just entering the global marketplace, as well as those of Global Fortune 50 firms.

Global Payroll Strategy

Jeitosa associates have extensive experience with a variety of global, international, and local payroll processing approaches, covering outsourced services to inhouse software to custom built solutions. From single to multiple instance systems, from regional to global systems, to a purely multi-local approach, we help companies design a comprehensive approach to payroll processing that integrates business processes and required data across the globe with the organization’s core financial, human resources, and reporting systems to put in place “one version of the truth” for all compensation and payroll-related information.

Benchmarking

Jeitosa associates have been conducting benchmark and best practice analysis in the global arena for over 25 years. We use our expertise to create a process that minimizes the work of the benchmark participants and maximizes the value of the outcome. From a small best practice data gathering effort on a discrete process to a full scale analysis of the cost and value of an entire global HR operation, our research arm has the tools and methodologies to assist in the determination of the right level of analysis then to execute the process to ensure a meaningful result that meets clients’ expectations.

http://www.jeitosa.com/strategy