paper 7: promoting sustainable performance (turpin)
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Promoting Sustainable Performance Applied research project
Key findings to date
James Turpin
Saturday 3rd July 2010
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Background informationResearch Assistant at Kent Business School
Member of the Centre for Employment, Competitiveness and Growth (ECG)
Dynamic Applied Research Centre Full-time researchers and PhDs Participation of a multi-disciplinary team of
academics Promotes high quality research into organisational
productivity, competitiveness and growth
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I. The Promoting Sustainable Performance projectBackground to the project Importance of the projectProject Methodology
II. Research FindingsThe Price and Quality ParadoxThe value of long term strategic planning
III. Summary
Overview of presentation
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I. The Promoting Sustainable Performance Project
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Background to the project
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Building on the success of the original INTERREG project
Concerned with achieving sustainable and productivity for organisations across all industries
Aiming to provide significant impact through interaction with SMEs and policymakers
Methodology230 completed surveys
69 face-to-face interviews
5 detailed case studies
2009 Leadership for Growth workshop
2010 Masterclass recovery event
2010 Leadership network6
II. Research Findings
Insight into the first findings from the Promoting Sustainable Performance project
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“Sustained commitment to one single strategy is usually necessary to achieve success and outperform competitors”.
Michael E. Porter
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However, our research would suggest that Kent-based Small and Medium Enterprises are combining both quality and price driven strategies…
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The demands of Price and Quality
Are businesses walking a tightrope?10
Conventional theory
Low Price
High Price
Low Quality High Quality11
A paradox…
67% of companies…
…report offering lower prices than their competitors
61% of companies…
…report offering better quality than their competitors12
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Growth was found to be linked to both :
A high emphasis on quality
A flexible approach to pricing
How do we start to explain this paradox?
1st
contributory factory to GROWTH…
Customer care
…Personal attention to customer needs
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74% of
companies…
Quality Standards
…with an ISO 9000 accreditation demonstratedGROWTH
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67% of
companies…
Performance Measurement
…measuring product/service quality reportedGROWTH
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Pricing
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23% of
companies…
…relying solely on price focused tactics demonstratedGROWTH
Lack of consultation Ad hoc planning of activities Short term focus – fire fighting
Firms lack of strategic planning capabilities
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But Growth was found to be fortuitous rather than planned…
III. Summary of key findingsGrowth can be influenced by:• Placing an emphasis on quality of product/service• Being able to read the market place• Gaining a sound understanding of the needs of the
customer• Maintaining a flexible strategy to pricing• A sound strategic planning capability
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The Centre’s contributionto sustainable performance
The Centre is feeding these results back to: business academics policymakers
through workshops, seminars and forums Leadership for growth workshop Business engagement forum Masterclass event on recovery and growth Owner-manager development programme
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Thank you.
For more information about the project and results, visit: www.ecg-kent.com
Source of pictures: Gettyimages.com
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