The view from here
2nd July 2005
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“There is a Chinese curse which says, ‘May he live in interesting times.’ Like it or not, we live
in interesting times…”
Robert F KennedyCape Town, June 7th 1966
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Our search for strategy
Towards 2012
County Commissioners Conference
Committee of The Council
Strategy working group
Chief Commissioners
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Our point of view on strategy….
Organisations who succeed focus on their core
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Organisations fail when they take their eye off the ball…
Watches
Oil and gas
Drugs3 stepsBatteries (Duracell)
Writing instru-ments (Parker)
2 stepsAfter shave lotion
Toiletries
1 stepWomenrazors
EuropeCoreRazors & blades
Luxury writinginstruments(Waterman)
Unrelated diversification
Gillette example
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Pathway to success
Mission
1. Define and focuson your core
3. Measure forsuccess
2. Drive it to full potential
4. Expandselectively
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Pathway to success
Mission
1. Define and focuson your core
• What are your objectives? How are they bounded?
• What levers will you pull to achieve these objectives?
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Identifying our core
• What are your best service offerings?
• What are your strongest capabilities?
• What are your most important resources?
• Who are your most important clients?
• What other key assets do you have?
Defining the Core
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Pathway to success
Mission
1. Define and focuson your core
• What are your objectives? How are they bounded?
• What levers will you pull to achieve these objectives?
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Pathway to success
Mission
1. Define and focuson your core
2. Drive it to full potential
• How high is high?• How do we get there—strategically,
operationally, organisationally?
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Pathway to success
Mission
1. Define and focuson your core
2. Drive it to full potential
• How high is high?
• How do we get there—strategically, operationally, organisationally?
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Pathway to success
Mission
1. Define and focuson your core
3. Measure forsuccess
2. Drive it to full potential
• What are the ‘vital few’?
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Pathway to success
Mission
1. Define and focuson your core
3. Measure forsuccess
2. Drive it to full potential
4. Expandselectively
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Metrics ensure your organisation stays focused
• Provide focus on right strategic issues
• Clarify if you are achieving your objectives
• Help align the organisation
• Create ‘rallying cry’ for change
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And our major strategic issue?
Retaining and recruiting adults
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Organisational: 5 imperatives
1. Provide clear direction and leadership
2. Make good decisions
3. Develop and deploy talented people
4. Excel at front line execution
5. Instil a high
performanceculture
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We’ve come a long way…
1990
2005
2012
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Do any of these sound familiar…
• Pet projects?
• Conflicting agendas?
• Resources spread too thin?
• Trying to be all things to all stakeholders?
• Squeaky wheel gets the attention?
• The ‘new new’ thing?
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We’ve come a long way…
1990
2005
2012
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2005
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200?
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We’ve come a long way…
1990
2005
2012
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If you take away one thing from today…
Focus, focus, focus
• Executing on a strategy well is much harder than developing a good strategy in the first place
• So it is far better to be the best at one thing than to be okay at lots of things. Winning requires…