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Three-by-Three Networking
Friday, September 30th, 2005

When one is networking with a company, it can be helpful to develop contacts in three different organizations.  Developing relationships with three people in each of the three organizations is a good idea as well. 

Why is it important to develop so many contacts?  What are the consequences of developing fewer contacts?  There may be better ways to deal with the outsourcing and reorganizations that have occurred in the last few years.  That said, this strategy can be very helpful in that regard. 

Consider the benefits of having different perspectives.  Imagine what it would be like to try meeting the needs of a company which had a few thousand employees, if one had access to only one perspective.  By having these different perspectives, one is more likely to understand the vision, business drivers, and tactical issues which can arise in connection with the services that one is providing.

Puzzle

Revised 1/4/2007.

Posted in Business Tips, Networking | No Comments »



What conditions would exist?
Friday, September 30th, 2005

Have you ever asked what conditions would exist that would cause someone to need another firm’s services?

This is a good question to ask when one is trying to identify firms that might find value in an introduction or in one’s services. It is also helpful when planning a sales or marketing strategy.

One may also want to turn the question around and ask what conditions will not exist in firms that need the services.  This approach is called “reversal.” 

By combining the basic question and the reversal, one can develop a better understanding of the situation and the person’s needs.  This allows one to provide better introductions, information, and more clearly identify the business drivers and vision that is contributing to an interest in one’s services or business.

As an example, one might ask the following questions:

What conditions will exist when the project is successful?

What conditions will not exist when the project is successful?

Think about some questions that you typically ask.  Have you tried asking the opposite question to help you test the answer more clearly?

Revised January 4, 2007.

Posted in Business Tips, Customers, Planning Tips | No Comments »



End of Quarter
Friday, September 30th, 2005

Today marks the end of the third quarter for companies that use the calendar year for their fiscal calendar.

In large organizations, the end of the third quarter is accompanied by a brief pause in purchases as the companies determine whether they are on target to meet their year end goals. In business, there simply is no substitute for results and organizations live or die by their bottom line business results.

Posted in Business Trends | 2 Comments »



Driving Cost Out of the Equation
Friday, September 30th, 2005

Sourcing professionals often talk about driving cost out of the equation. Sadly, sometimes sourcing professonals fail to look for opportunities to do so. Instead, they often push the costs over to the supplier and think that is good enough.

When trying to reduce cost, the starting point it is to ask what we are doing or requiring suppliers to do which contributes cost without also contributing value.

Shipping costs and modification costs are two areas where there is a lot of unnecessary cost. (There are others as well.) Suppliers often overnight reports to customers, when second day delivery or even an e-mailed report would be sufficient. If customers are making changes to specs on a regular basis because they don’t know what they need when the customers initially engage the suppliers, the customers are driving up the suppliers’ costs, and their own.

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Maximize your success
Friday, September 30th, 2005

When you have a great business idea, are you concerned with making sure that you get credit for it? It seems to me like it makes much more sense to give the credit to the person who has the best opportunity to carry the idea forward.

When you focus on the vision and the goals, rather than yourself, it is much easier to give the credit to the person who is most likely to make the idea successful.

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Continuous Improvements…
Friday, September 30th, 2005

Businesses need to look at their operations and find ways to improve. We sometimes get “stuck in a rut” and forget that continuous improvement needs to be a way of life for us. We need to challenge ourselves to be better today than yesterday.

There are two questions that we should always ask ourselves, and should invite others to ask us as well. What is working well? What is not working as well as we would like?

Posted in Business Tips | No Comments »



Does it matter if you like the other company?
Thursday, September 29th, 2005

When one looks at this question objectively, the answer should be that it doesn’t matter if we like the other company or not. At the end of the day, managers and employees are paid to achieve their employers’ business objectives. Liking the other company, be it a supplier or a customer, is irrelevant to the question of whether the business objectives are achieved.

That’s the theory. What is the practice? Does it matter if you like the other company?

Posted in Business Tips, Business Trends | No Comments »



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