As of June 2016 I have moved my series of articles on what causes firm valuation to increase from the Forum Newspaper to a new internet newspaper, ShreveportNews.com. These will be collected here under the title Notes on Growing Wealth in the For-profit Firm 2016, 2017, etc. Thanks for your continued support.
I am going to take somewhat of a detour from the purpose of this series of articles that discusses points of view and frameworks to aid in the growth of the market value of for-profit firms. However, readers will see that the extent to which government can be an enabler of free enterprise, this article does contribute to that purpose.
What keeps you up at night? Chances are it is the nagging things that are being delayed for seemingly no reason or things that are putting your business at risk. Some of these risk factors simply need to be insured or you have to self-insure them via some kind of reserve fund in case something goes wrong.
I know this will seem arrogant, but after thirty-five years of being honored to work for and with numerous CEOs in a host of industries, coupled with my academic research, I have five questions that in one hour can tell you how your firm is doing and what needs to be worked on next.
This is Part 2 of an article I published last week for Linked In and last month for website readers. I felt it was important to start this discussion as we are in a new round of some experts providing confusion around which group is more important for the for-profit firm: shareholders (or owners in the private for-profit firm), customers or employees? If you missed it the article can be found in the archives of this newspaper or at my website cited below.
Here we go again – the debate over which group should be the most important focus for a for-profit business is on us again. Should it be shareholders (or owners for the private for-profit firm), customers or employees? Which group should take priority in setting the major goals for the for-profit firm? Due to space limitations and given the importance of these topics, this article will come in two parts.
This is the first and perhaps only article I will write about something we have developed and are now offering as our comprehensive consulting service. So dear reader please indulge me. I normally write about topics that I think are important for the strategic management of for-profit firms and while I give my opinions, I try to write objectively. I cite other works I think are authoritative on each topic, but not this time. This is an all out marketing piece that I also hope will inform and excite you. But please stop reading if I offend you. If you do read further however and find this interesting, there are two Working Papers in this website for further detail. And by the way Bill Bigler Associates offers a variety of bread-and-butter, tried and true services. The Business Performance Engine is a near complete approach to strategic management of your firm and we realize most firms will not engage us for such a comprehensive offering. But each firm can take away something from it in our writings.
Good strategic planning can be very useful for your firm if done appropriately. But as we all know the current business world has opportunities and threats popping up almost weekly for most firms. This suggests to some people that strategic planning as we have known it must change or is irrelevant altogether. So how can you then strategically think about, plan for and take action in your business with all this change happening?
We know that asking grown adults to change is typically very difficult. We get used to our routines. This is true in our daily lives and at work as well. Take the golf swing for example. It is estimated it takes twenty-one days at three hours a day to change even something simple in a golf swing – say a change in the way the golfer grips the club. Most of us give up and go back to the way we did it before.
You might be thinking how in the world Bigler (your writer) is going to pull this one off. This is a weighty title and you the reader probably just said “Riiiight”.
This article is a follow on to the one I wrote two months ago on your firm’s Vision, Mission, Values, and Purpose.
Some analysts are asking if Apple has seen better days. The Apple stock price looks down 33% since 7-20-2015. I do not want to seem insensitive, as the world lost a tremendous business mind and talent and person in Steven Jobs with his passing in 2011, but the question of this article: “Are celebrity CEOs to be brought in among your people or does this create a slippery slope to be avoided?
Let’s revisit a topic I covered only a bit in this series four years ago. CEOs are told their firms need a Vision, Mission and Values set of statements. I think they can be useful but they must be carefully crafted and done at the right time. If not carefully crafted or timed incorrectly, their articulation can be a huge waste of time and cause cynicism in your firm’s people.