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Change and Transformation
“The Beacon Group’s program proved to be a transformational experience for our staff, and has created a new, more open culture of creativity and collaboration that has given The Globe and Mail a marked and measurable competitive advantage.” — Phillip Crawley
“The Beacon Group’s thought provoking curriculum utilizes best practice tools and interactive media for evaluation, assessment and overall learning. It has helped us raise the bar on our calibre of talent.” — Ernst Lieb
“The Beacon Group was able to handle our 360 reviews across 9 offices in a manner that brought significant value to our partners, the firm and ultimately our clients.” — Judson Whiteside
“The human capital programs provided by The Beacon Group are best in class.” — Tye Burt
“The Beacon Group acted as a strategic partner and was instrumental in helping us raise the bar on candid dialogue and team performance.” — Robert Courteau
“The Beacon Group approaches very serious and difficult topics in an accessible and insightful way.” — Eric Siegel
“We engaged The Beacon Group when we needed to bring two cultures together after our first major international acquisition: the evidence of their success lies in both the subsequent growth in our business and our presence in more than twelve countries on five continents.” — Rupert Duchesne
“The Beacon Group excels in facilitating open & candid dialogue that has fostered superior team performance.” — Mary Ellen Carlyle
“Top-level thought leadership, combined with practical, cost-effective solutions—that’s the real value the Beacon Group team brings to bear on Foresters talent challenges.” — Suanne Nielsen
“The Beacon Group delivered cutting edge perspectives on many human capital topics that were tailored and customized to our company in a way that we could not have obtained at more generic, cookie-cutter advising shops.” — Doug Lord
“Doug Williamson and his team were of invaluable assistance in helping our organization navigate through a completely new strategic planning process and emerge with a three year plan resoundingly endorsed by our Board. Doug’s global perspectives and ability to drive consensus was an integral part of our success.” — Don Forgeron
“The Global HR & Communications senior team engaged the Beacon Group in shepherding us through a unique strategic planning process that involved an outside-in view of our current and future workforce and how this aligns to our business strategy. Thanks to Doug and his team it was a thought provoking process that sharpened our strategic thinking and, in the end, made our strategy stronger.” — Sylvia Chrominska
“The Beacon Group’s customized and personalized approach fit our needs perfectly. From the initial self-discovery phase all the way to recommending solutions, the work they have done has been consistently world-class. They combine strong analytics with a wealth of real world experience. They are focused, targeted and are experts at taking theoretic concepts and making them real. We look forward to working with Doug and his team as we continue to elevate our business and improve our internal performance.” — Don Romano
“I have had the pleasure of working with The Beacon Group and Doug Williamson for several years across several organizations and have always been impressed with their professionalism, work ethic and customer orientation. Doug's own highly energetic and highly customized approach to the specific needs of our business and our leadership team sets him apart from other strategic facilitators and objective "thought provokers" I have experienced. I am always grateful and impressed by the tangible results his interventions tend to produce.” — Lloyd A. Perlmutter
“The big contribution was The Beacon Group challenged our culture and our comfort level. We then arrived at a clear plan of concise deliverables that we needed to execute to move forward on our vision.” — Tony Ambler
“SKF approached The Beacon Group to develop our Talent Management program. The process implemented by Doug Williamson and his team was extremely important for us in determining how to execute the program on a clear, organized and systematic way. This was one of our most important projects that will enable us to ensure our sustainable growth.” — João Ricciarelli
“Through its sound and strategically practical business knowledge and experience The Beacon Group has and continues to assist SCI in better understanding and enabling our organization to build engaged teams and leadership capability to help make our supply chain clients more competitive.” —John Ferguson |
Provocative PropositionsIn the hyperactive and challenging world in which we all live, it is becoming harder and harder for business leaders to find time to read, reflect and gain insight from the many valuable sources at our disposal. In "Provocative Propositions", The Beacon Group attempts to fill that void by offering our opinion, often rather pointed, on a wide array of issues we believe are relevant to leading a modern organization. The articles are catalogued into 12 categories so you can quickly and easily find a topic of particular interest. We then offer three easy steps under the heading "In Our Opinion" to help business leaders take action on the key themes. Simply click on the category and read away. Advantage at the Fringe
In today's business environment, competitive advantages rapidly erode. Entire industries are transforming and being overwhelmed by new developments.
The Internet is shifting power from companies to consumers. Product and strategy life cycles are shrinking. Deregulation and globalization are opening up entire industries to an onslaught of nimble low-cost competitors. The Fact is organizations using yesterday's rigid management principles are not adaptable or creative enough to handle these challenges. The Problem is innovation is stifled by the norms of organizational structures. Individuals who deviate from this structure are identified as renegades and discouraged from contributing. The Outcome is organizations deal with change in a traumatic fashion. They aren't nimble, they aren't creative and they aren't proactive. The Solution is management innovation. For far too long companies stuck to the same corporate regime. Products and branding are refreshed regularly, but the process by which we organize resources, plan and aggregate effort has remained untouched. The Ultimate Advantage In his book Gary Hamel's "The Future of Management" he argues, management innovation isn't just any innovation. "When compared to other sorts of innovation, it has an unmatched power to create dramatic and enduring shifts in competitive advantage". Ever wondered why all companies have the same hierarchy with CEOs and VPs? Management innovation is "anything that substantially alters the way in which the work of the organization is carried out, or significantly modifies customary organizational forms, and, by doing so, advances organizational goals". Three conditions are needed for successful management innovation:
Not every management innovation creates a lasting advantage. The key is to keep innovating and challenging existing processes. Escaping the shackles Hamel says "'it's not human nature that limits the pace and scope of management, it's our unexamined beliefs". To escape the process of conventional thinking you have to "distinguish between beliefs that describe the world as it is, and beliefs that describe the world as it is and must forever remain". Which assumptions in your firm need to be challenged? Adaptability What is adaptability? Adaptability is an aptitude that strengthens an organization's ability to be constantly creative and empowering to its employees. Hamel points to five key points of adaptability: Markets: Increasing choices and moving resources to high-value uses. Life: Promoting variety and selection. Democracy: Creating an environment of activism and open challenge to create change. Faith: The search for purpose, meaning and significance. Cities: Increasing the ability to make discoveries by accident. The Fringe "You can't see the future if you're standing in the mainstream". The fringe is where you should be looking for management innovation ideas. Hamel wants you to implement six challenges into your organization. Whole Foods, W.L. Gore and Google. What do they have in common? They are the "fringe" in management principles today. They encourage management participation at all levels, allocate resources to foster creativity and behave proactively. Yet Hamel says these companies aren't good enough. It's just the tip of the iceberg in management innovation. In Our Opinion The Beacon Group's Keys to Fostering Management Change These are the questions you should be asking in your organization: Creating a democracy of ideas - How can your company encourage more open exchange? Amplifying human imagination - What has your company done to make your employees innovators? Reallocating resources for adaptability - How do you allocate experimental capital? Aggregate wisdom - How do you tap into the intelligence of all employees in your organization? Minimize the influence of old paradigms - Is executive decision-making determined by foresight or by the past? Allow everyone to participate - Can people choose where to make their best contributions in your organization? |
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