Archive for February, 2008

Can the king lead the revolution?

According to C.K. Prahalad, the University of Michigan management professor who coauthored the book “Competing For The Future,” this concept is based on the incorrect assumption that top managers can develop strategy and force everyone else to implement it.

In effective organizations, he says, real change is enabled by the people lower down in the organization who are closer to new technologies, to customers and competitors.

In an interview with strategy+business (3Q 96 p84), Dr. Prahalad said, “If you think about strategy as a revolution, as discovery, as innovation, as changing industry norms and industry patterns, then you must acknowledge that no monarchy has ever fomented its own revolution. In other words, senior management does not have a great propensity for change.”

So, how can you get the best ideas from people throughout your organization? Try this…

Continue Reading Add comment February 20, 2008

What is marketing anyway?

For most of my career, I have owned, operated, served and consulted with small to mid-size businesses. I don’t pretend to know how Fortune 500 corporation executives think about marketing, but I have a pretty good idea about the other guys.

Most of the owners, presidents and CEOs I’ve worked with over the years, have talked about marketing as all the things they do to support the sales process. I like that. It’s not an academic answer, but it makes sense in the real word. 

Marketing is all the meetings we have to discuss our products and how to make them better. It is advertising — online, offline, wherever. It is brochures, mailers, podcasts, and press releases. It is great support, excellent customer service, so customers will give us another chance the next time they want what we have to sell. 


1 comment February 19, 2008


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