23
2015What is the cost of doing nothing?
According to the Human Potential Project, “There is an insidious and silent killer of productivity and profitability that is affecting your P&L every year. For some this will be measured in millions, for others in billions.” What they were referring to is the high cost of maintaining their status quo and doing nothing. This dilemma isn’t new; it’s been around since the beginning of time….
21
2015Death of a Salesman – Fact or Fiction?
No, this isn’t an article about Arthur Miller’s Pulitzer Prize winning play about Willy Loman. Instead, I want to address one of the three big myths that were debunked at the recent SiriusDecisions Sales and Marketing Summit last week in Nashville. They reported that popular metrics indicate that buyers are 57% of the way through their purchase process before they engage a sales rep. They…
11
2015Are you using Predictive Analytics?
Although I was aware that the idea and use of predictive analytics has been around for a while, I never really thought much about it. I guess I simply thought of it as something analysts used to calculate risk at a very high level within an organization. Boy, was I sheltered! A really good friend of mine and thought leader in industry today, Judy Mod,…
04
2015Use It, or Lose It!
One of the biggest problems with any kind of training today is that what is learned in those training classes is lost in a very short period of time. According to findings by the International Journal of Project Management, “Around 40% of the knowledge acquired in training is lost after 1 month, rising to 90% after 6 months.” Those statistics shouldn’t be a surprise to…
28
2015Just-In-Time Sales & Marketing Resources
Most of us will relate to the term “Just In Time” to Supply Chain Management of resources and goods for manufacturing. The concept is designed to eliminate companies ordering and storing all of the items they need in inventory in order to reduce the cost of warehouse space and reduce overhead. So they work with their suppliers to provide the items they need just when…
06
2015Risk Assessment – Are You Doing It?
There are many forms of risk facing every facet of your business today. Most people consider the risks that are presented through manufacturing or construction, and those clearly present the most physical forms of risk. One might also consider financial risk, which is also an important risk to assess when companies think of investing in a new venture, plant, equipment, etc. According to this week’s…
09
2015Can you fill the Knowledge Gap when you have Unexpected Vacancies?
What happens when you have an employee that has mission-critical knowledge and all of a sudden they are unexpectedly gone? It’s the unexpected part that always catches us by surprise, isn’t it? I mean who plans to get sick, injured, have a family emergency, be in an accident, or even die? But it happens every day in our business lives. So, can you fill the…
04
2015The Problem When Knowledge Isn’t Shared
Has this ever happened in your organization where you discover that because departments don’t capture and share their knowledge, they do the same process completely different? What was the outcome? Which group followed corporate or operational guidelines? Who didn’t? Was there an inherent flaw on the way one group performed over the other? Why in the world would one group have one process or protocol…
10
2015How will the Skilled Worforce Shortage Affect Your Business?
A good friend and mentor of mine, Jeff Klingberg, President and CEO of The Mountain Stream Group, in Chicago, www.mountainstreamgroup.com has been sharing some really important insight into what’s going on in the world of manufacturing today. Jeff’s engineering background, and our discussions regarding knowledge management and capturing corporate knowledge led him to forward me Plant Engineering 2014 Workforce Development Study: 6 key findings, by…