Archive for the ‘Business Continuity’ Category

Richard Martin’s Monday Morning Brilliant Manoeuvres – 22 April 2013

Posted: April 22, 2013 in Brilliant Manoeuvres, Business Continuity, Contingency Planning, Crisis Leadership, Enterprise Robustness, Ethics, Exploiting Change, Geopolitics, Leadership, Leadership Principles, Military Lessons, Monday Morning Brilliant Manoeuvres, Never Fight Fair, Personal Development, Strategy
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Brilliant Manoeuvre
No one can predict the future, much to the chagrin of many economists and financial theorists and their media acolytes, who prefer assumptions of perfect knowledge and decision-making in all circumstances.

Discussion
I’m breaking my deliberate policy of not commenting on political issues this week in order to comment on reactions to the Boston Marathon bombings last Monday. My personal opinion is that the response of government and law enforcement agencies at all levels has been brilliant in the circumstances. However, there are already Monday Morning Quarterbacks saying that the government overreacted by shuttingn down Boston on Friday and part of Saturday. The problem is that the ones responsible for making these decisions can only plan and act based on information available at the time and the factors they felt they needed to consider. Just throwing out there that they overreacted without knowing those things is pure speculation based on specious counterfactuals or a personal hobby horse. If there is something I learned from a 26-year military career and my study of military strategy and history, it is that decisions that can look sub-optimal in hindsight may have been the best at the time given the circumstances of friction, uncertainty, and the fog of war. In this particular case, only a full after-action review will permit the systemic learning to occur. Saying it was an overreaction is nothing but pure hindsight bias.

Tip
The more complex and risky the undertaking, the more likely that friction will wreak havoc. We must compensate by building robustness, resiliency and redundancy into our plans and systems.

From the Vault
A Superb Example of Crisis Leadership in Action

By the way…
My ideas were featured in the March 25th Globe and Mail: A military approach to business.

Richard Martin is a consultant, speaker, and executive coach. He brings his military and business leadership and management experience to bear for executives and organizations seeking to exploit change, maximize opportunity, and minimize risk.

© 2013 Richard Martin. Reproduction and quotes are permitted with proper attribution.

How Robust Is Your Business?

Posted: October 26, 2011 in Business, Business Continuity, Contingency Planning, Enterprise Robustness, Entrepreneurship, Small Business, Succession planning
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CBC News is reporting this morning on a TD Waterhouse poll result indicating only about a quarter of small businesses have a succession plan in place for when the founder/owner retires.

That’s pretty bad, in and of itself. But even worse is the fact that right now, most small businesses are completely reliant on their founder/owners as principal marketer and salesperson, operations head, director of HR, head of procurement and supply, production manager, etc. etc.

It’s inevitable that a small business owner will do most if not all of the work at the beginning, but as the business grows, the company’s knowledge, skill set, and processes must be progressively systematized. The key is to get what is in the owner’s head out into the systems and processes and structures of the enterprise. This is so that employees can act and innovate based on the owner’s knowledge and acumen.

A few years ago, I was chatting with the president of a small tool supply business. The owner, a man in his early 50s, had succumbed to a massive heart attack and died on the job. When everyone in the company got over the initial shock, they realized that everything of consequence about running that business was in the owner’s head. We’re talking processes, supplier lists, client contacts, stocks, financials. Everything. The new president admitted freely that the company almost went under, simply because no one knew who to contact upstream or downstream, or even the full picture of the business. Disaster was averted (beyond the death of the owner), but it could easily have been otherwise.

Companies, even very small businesses, need to think about worst case scenarios. For a small business, the worst case is always the permanent or temporary loss of the owner/president. Can the company operate for a length of time without it’s principal impetus to action? Would employees know who to call at clients or suppliers? Do they know who the insurance brokers are? Do they have a relationship with the banker? How about the accountant?

The owner doesn’t need to die for this to be a major hindrance to the company. It could be personal or family illness, injury, or just overwork, leading to the principal not being at his or her personal best for a length of time.

The time to prepare for these situations is now, when everything is operating smoothly. Even small businesses must improve their robustness. This is the ability to survive and even thrive in adverse circumstances.

© 2011 Richard Martin. Reproduction and quotes permitted with full and proper attribution.

Car dealers are feeling the pinch of factory shutdowns in Japan

Posted: April 22, 2011 in Business, Business Continuity, Contingency Planning, Exploiting Change, Risk Management
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The earthquake in Japan is having a ripple effect around the world. I just came from our car dealership. The salesman said they will run out of cars for sale before the end of May. This is a direct consequence of production shutdowns in Japan as a result of the devastation caused by the earthquake. We’re also not just talking about Japanese manufacturers, but also North American car makers. It is hitting all industries.

There is obviously a business continuity impact from the earthquake. Could manufacturers have foreseen this impact? No doubt, but this is also a much larger event than, say, a single factory fire disrupting a global supply chain. Manufacturers obviously had limited stocks of parts and components when the earthquake hit, and they have now worked their way through these.

This shows more than global interdependence. It also shows just how vulnerable manufacturers throughout the world can be to integrated supply and logistics chains.