Back to Basics: How To Make More Money Now
Many small manufacturers ignore the improvement strategies that could improve profits now, while positioning themselves for growth tomorrow. Here is why that is not the best idea.
Margin Isn’t Enough
"When a management with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for bad economics, it is the reputation of the business that remains intact.” By Alec Pendleton, Big Ideas for Small Companies I grew up in a family manufacturing business, which my father had built from nothing over years of assembling the right management team, acquiring compatible companies, and steadily improving operations. By the time I arrived on the scene, there were about a dozen plants and [...]
Employee Engagement for Productivity — and Profits
Your organization can’t perform better than your least-engaged employee. Why?
As Never Before
Occasionally we all need to do what we’ve never done before, what we’ve never even considered before and embrace revolutionary change personally and within our organizations.
Don’t Just Talk About a Skills Gap — Do Something!
You can complain about the skills gap, or you can leverage the 3Es and fix it. Here's how.
Committees and Car Talk
By Alec Pendleton, Big Ideas for Small Companies Consider the modern automobile. From the moment an idea is hatched until the finished product is delivered to a buyer, the process is kind of a miracle. There are, I’m told, about 25,000 parts in a typical car, and every one of them had to go through basically the same process: someone had an idea, and that led to developing specifications, which led to design, then to manufacture, to assembly, to delivery. [...]
Brew It Forward
By George Taninecz I’ve had the pleasure to know and support talented individuals who worked within the corporate and operations brain trust of Toyota, were guided by Toyota legends, emulated the practices of Toyota in their own companies, and/or devoted distinguished careers to studying and communicating Toyota concepts. One common denominator of continuous improvement appears in all of their work — a perpetual cycle of coaching and mentoring that over time creates a culture of problem solvers and change makers [...]
Hard decision?
By Alec Pendleton Are you facing a hard decision in your business today? Let’s face it, the answer to that is usually “yes”. On any given day, there’s typically something that’s gnawing away at you, something you’re struggling with. To me, the first question to ask is simple: whether or not the decision is really “hard”. That may sound like a silly question, but really, it’s not. The question is whether the decision is hard, or just unpleasant. Over many [...]
IoT Magic?
By John R. Brandt Here’s something I bet you didn’t know: The Internet of Things (IoT) isn’t just a digital revolution, but also a magical place in which the ordinary rules of business and finance don’t apply. Don’t believe me? Just ask a bunch of manufacturing executives.[1] First, they’ll tell you that they and their companies aren’t yet ready for the IoT: Only 11% have an IoT process strategy in place, Only 12% have an IoT product strategy in [...]
Were You Profitable TODAY?
By Alec Pendleton, Big Ideas for Small Companies How much does it cost to operate your business for a day? I have two companies, a manufacturer and a wholesaler. It costs $34,000 each day to operate the manufacturing company, and $3,200 to operate the wholesaler. Why is that important? It serves as an instant indicator of profitability, and gives me the earliest possible warning of developing problems. The numbers are calculated very simply. They are the total annual cost of [...]
The Art of Measurement
by Alec Pendleton What do you measure in your business? Too often, the answer is: The wrong stuff. Many leaders simply look at the numbers their accountants or software give them, without asking: What do I really need to monitor, so that we have opportunities for improved operations — and higher profitability? Paradoxically, when devising measurements to manage by, it’s typically a good first step to decide what NOT to measure. A great example of this can be found in [...]
The Problem with Most Thought Leadership Today is Simple: It’s Godawful Boring
It doesn’t seem to matter who publishes it, whether a big accounting or consulting firm, or a leading IT company. And it doesn’t much matter if it’s a white paper, a blog, an assessment tool, a LinkedIn post, or a tweet. Most thought leadership — which collectively costs billions of dollars to develop and distribute — seems crafted not to engage and not to offend. It’s just another checked box on the annual marketing plan. Here’s a typical example (fill [...]