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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. The Leverage of Rebels
Paper pushers, desk jockeys, automatons, this is what so many business people are encouraged to become in too many organizations. Perfection, six sigma, ISO regulations, while great in many respects, are hurting a number of other aspects in business. If your organization produces the same work, reports, and outputs day after day, you’re headed down a slippery slope.
The fact is – many organizations are structured in a way that employees are being brainwashed to work at the level of the lowest common denominator. The problem is – by having a workforce of replaceable drones is cost effective, it isn’t going to take your company to new staggering heights. The Outcome is – organization after organization doing good work, which happens to satisfy people, as opposed to great work, that causes customers to flock to your unique organization. The Solution is – free up your employees to find out what they can do better than anyone else, to become rebels. Changing the Game According to author Seth Godin, your organization may be treating your employees like bowling. You lock them down and impose an upper limit of performance, much like in bowling where there is a maximum score – 300. This is completely contradictory to the concept of a rebel. It’s time to change the “game”. It’s time to understand that the” keep your head down, follow instructions, suck it up” mentality is gone. What your organization needs now is an employee population that is encouraged to be remarkable, connect people and ideas, make judgment calls, and create art. It’s possible, it’s time to create and nurture your rebels. Holding it all together If you’re lost in what to look for when you’re searching through your organization looking for your rebels, it’s quite simple - Charm, Talent, Perseverance. Sure many of your employees have one or two of these characteristics, and are successful; however the real magic happens when you combine all three. Therefore be sure to look for examples of each, within the same employee (or even yourself). In the event that you find a number of employees with two of the factors, allow them to develop their skills in the third component. For example, for those missing:
The Gift What if you freed up your workforce to create exciting new twists on your current offering? Twists that delight your customers, twists that revolutionize your industry. This is the very premise of developing rebels. At a fundamental level, there is an ongoing dynamic between an individual and their boss, one of give and take. This cycle is interrupted when the “individual” is a rebel. Instead of give and take, it becomes give-rejoice-give, wherein you provide your manager with “art” and they ensure you have the winning conditions required to further act as a rebel. In Our Opinion The Beacon Group’s Key’s to becoming a Rebel Adopt a New mindset – Up until now, you haven’t seen yourself as a rebel, more of a cog. While cogs keep things moving, they can be replaced, with more efficient cogs. A rebel on the other hand holds everything together. Find ways to put yourself at the centre of everything, adding value constantly. Unlearn everything – Since you were in grade school you’ve been taught to do a number of things that will prevent you from becoming a true rebel – sit in rows, show up every day, strive to be perfect. This isn’t how artists or rebel think. Embrace the mess, find excitement, and channel it into new endeavours. Dig in – If you truly want to become a rebel, get ready for a long climb. You will be one of few, and you’ll be working against a system. Be strong. When you pull through it will be worth the effort. And, surprisingly enough, once you’re a rebel, it won’t be an effort going forward. |
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