I have always been fascinated with the question “if being different/better than ones competitors is so desirable why do so few companies ever achieve it?”. Kevin Maney in his book Trade-Off (Broadway Books, NY 2009) provides at least a partial answer to the question. Maney, a former writer on technology for the USA Today, makes insightful observations on the reasons behind some of the classic examples of the successes and failures in becoming uncommon.
Maney’s proposition is that it is all about trade-offs. It is about picking how you are going to be different and sticking to that difference. He suggests that there are fundamentally two positioning that matter—fidelity and convenience. Fidelity, he defines, as the total experience that a customer has with a company’s product or service. Companies that choose Fidelity deliver an experience that is superior to their competition. The second positioning, Convenience, is about making it easy to get something. A company that chooses Convenience makes their products/services easier to get, easier to use,etc. The best positioned companies pick one of these--Fidelity or Convenience.
Maney also explains the two common mistakes that most companies make in trying to become uncommon. The first mistake is what he calls landing in the “fidelity belly”. This positioning is neither fish (fidelity) nor fowl (convenience). I find that the majority of companies fall here. They do not do what it takes to be different. They are happy to go along in the pack. Their results tend to be at the industry average or slightly below average. The second mistake is what Maney calls the “fidelity illusion”. Here companies try to be both high fidelity and convenient. I have always argued that attempting this fails because the there are never enough resources to pull off both. Maney argues an additional point that attempting both results in an undermining of the both. Companies that have a fidelity positioning to start with undermine the uniqueness of their positioning when the experience becomes ubiquitous.
Making trade-offs is tough. If it wasn’t then everyone would be doing it. But for those leaders that have the courage to make the trade-offs the rewards are great for their business. I agree with Maney that this is one of the keys to long term success and growth for companies.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
A few weeks ago I responded to a posting on LinkedIn regarding a question on organization design. Attached is the original question and my response.
"Job assignments and org structure for a team of 12
My boss is asking me to help him restructure our team of 12 people. I admit I haven't been asked to think about this kind of thing since I graduated in 2002. Thoughts? Ideas? Suggestions? "
Alyce,
Restructuring, especially at the team level, should start with an inventory of the work of the team. Structure should follow the work--not the people. I would suggest that you focus on the output of your team's work as a guide to the level of detail necessary. Ask yourself what are the products/services that we deliver to others outside of our team? Once you have answered this question you have the basic building blocks for your restructuring.
Next, I would suggest that you use the restructuring as a chance to assess the work fo the team. Ask the following questions:
Is this work the most important things we can do to serve our customers/clients? Is there work that we continue to do that is no longer valued by our client/customers?
Is there work that we are not doing that would be of higher value than the current work that we do? These guestions should lead you to decide that there is work that your team should Start, Stop and Continue.
Your next task should be to organize the work into roles. But before you can do this you need to answer another question. Is this group of people really a "team" or is this a group of twelve people that happen to report to the same boss? The following questions will help you to assess the "teamness":
Are our products/services produced through the interdependent work of multiple team members? Or are our products and services produced by individuals in the group working on their own?
Do those who receive our products and services view us as a "team"? Or do our clients/customers view us as individual providers?
Do we view ourselves as a team (we work together to produce our products and services)? Or do we view ourselves as individual contributors (working independently to produce products and services)?
Are we held collectively accountable for the quality and performance of our products and services? Or are we held individually accountable for our products and services?
These questions should help you determine whether the roles you create should be team-based roles (Team-based roles usually have high degrees of overlap and breath) or individual-based roles (Individual-based roles have a high degree of specialization and low amounts of overlap).
Your final task will now be to define the roles. My advice to you here is to create roles that make the most sense in serving your clients/customers versus designing roles around the people that you currently have. This usually means the new roles will be very different from the existing role (hence the restructuring). Start with the customers/clients and then work back to product/services--functional expertise should be the last factor. Build the right roles for the work that you do and the clients/customers that you serve. Your clients will notice. You will know the difference.
Good luck!
Randy Stott
"Job assignments and org structure for a team of 12
My boss is asking me to help him restructure our team of 12 people. I admit I haven't been asked to think about this kind of thing since I graduated in 2002. Thoughts? Ideas? Suggestions? "
Alyce,
Restructuring, especially at the team level, should start with an inventory of the work of the team. Structure should follow the work--not the people. I would suggest that you focus on the output of your team's work as a guide to the level of detail necessary. Ask yourself what are the products/services that we deliver to others outside of our team? Once you have answered this question you have the basic building blocks for your restructuring.
Next, I would suggest that you use the restructuring as a chance to assess the work fo the team. Ask the following questions:
Is this work the most important things we can do to serve our customers/clients? Is there work that we continue to do that is no longer valued by our client/customers?
Is there work that we are not doing that would be of higher value than the current work that we do? These guestions should lead you to decide that there is work that your team should Start, Stop and Continue.
Your next task should be to organize the work into roles. But before you can do this you need to answer another question. Is this group of people really a "team" or is this a group of twelve people that happen to report to the same boss? The following questions will help you to assess the "teamness":
Are our products/services produced through the interdependent work of multiple team members? Or are our products and services produced by individuals in the group working on their own?
Do those who receive our products and services view us as a "team"? Or do our clients/customers view us as individual providers?
Do we view ourselves as a team (we work together to produce our products and services)? Or do we view ourselves as individual contributors (working independently to produce products and services)?
Are we held collectively accountable for the quality and performance of our products and services? Or are we held individually accountable for our products and services?
These questions should help you determine whether the roles you create should be team-based roles (Team-based roles usually have high degrees of overlap and breath) or individual-based roles (Individual-based roles have a high degree of specialization and low amounts of overlap).
Your final task will now be to define the roles. My advice to you here is to create roles that make the most sense in serving your clients/customers versus designing roles around the people that you currently have. This usually means the new roles will be very different from the existing role (hence the restructuring). Start with the customers/clients and then work back to product/services--functional expertise should be the last factor. Build the right roles for the work that you do and the clients/customers that you serve. Your clients will notice. You will know the difference.
Good luck!
Randy Stott
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