PHOENIX — Hard choices and hard decisions are not just the purview of food retailers and manufacturers looking to make their businesses sustainable and relevant. Challenges of various kinds are being faced by a wide swath of other industries, especially those that cater to a fast-evolving consumer population.

At yesterday’s Food Marketing Institute (FMI) Midwinter Executive Conference here, I had the privilege of moderating a panel discussion with senior executives from a number of other disciplines – sports, journalism, entertainment and advertising – to examine how they are approaching their specific business challenges.

Laura Hollingsworth, for example, is the president and publisher of the Des Moines Register and Des Moines Register Media, as well as President of the West Group for Gannett’s U.S. Community Publishing Division. She told the audience that while newspapers are widely believed to be dying, the truth is that only the “paper” part seems to be endangered, and that her company is endeavoring to reinvent itself as a content provider that cuts across all media, able to provide it to consumers via iPads or other new technologies. One interesting comment from Hollingsworth: She said that she does not measure herself or her company’s success by benchmarks within the newspaper industry, but rather believes that Gannett must “distance” itself from the competition by doing things differently.

The importance of being a content provider also was stressed by Beau Fraser, Managing Director of The Gate Worldwide, a global advertising agency with offices in New York, Europe and Asia, as well as the co-author of “Death to All Sacred Cows.” Fraser said that more than ever, ad agencies – while continuing to be in the primary business of coming up with good ideas for clients – have to be in the content generating business, going deeper and wider than ever, providing information to a demanding and insatiable consumer population in a wide variety of venues. ‘Don Draper would probably not recognize The Gate as an ad agency if he walked in the front door,” he said.

Gerry Lopez, President/CEO of AMC Entertainment Holdings, the nation’s second largest movie theatre chain, pointed to all the ways in which his company is working to know and serve its customers better – developing a frequent theater-goer program that is modeled on Amazon.com’s for acting on previous behavior and rewarding consistency, developing better foodservice programs and even serving alcohol in certain locations as a way of bringing in new customers, and finding ways to source films not being provided by the major studios – in essence developing a private brand to compete with the national brands.

And Stu Upson, Executive Director of the US Bowling Congress, which has more than two million members, spoke to the challenges his industry is facing – bowling centers that have invested in restaurants and other entertainment options (such as video games) as a way of attracting new customers, but run the risk of alienating frequent bowlers who don’t like the changes. Upson said that the industry has to be very careful about balancing short-term returns with long-term strategic priorities, which is made more difficult in an environment that offers young people so many entertainment alternatives.

All of the participants pointed to the importance of providing strong leadership – that while consensus is important, at the end of the day they have to make the tough decisions, sharing the credit if things work and shouldering the blame when things go wrong. And they agreed that it is critical to be able to look at and change their businesses without being jaundiced by the past.

It certainly is doable. The fifth panelist, Leo Hopf, a teacher, consultant and co-author of “Rethink, Reinvent, Reposition: 12 Strategies to Renew Your Business and Boost Your Bottom Line,” told the story of Boise Cascade, a lumber company that saw its business model as being unsustainable and decided to sell all of its mills and buy Office Max, a retailing enterprise that it believed had a brighter future than its traditional business.

I can’t speak for the audience … but I hope they found the panelists to be as interesting as I did.

(BTW…both “Death to All Sacred Cows” and “Rethink, Reinvent, Reposition: 12 Strategies to Renew Your Business and Boost Your Bottom Line” are available on Amazon.com.)

There are plenty of books about business strategy, but not many that focus on identifying and implementing strategies for renewal in the mature phase of the lifecycle of a business, according to Leo Hopf and William Welter in their book Rethink Reinvent Reposition: 12 Strategies to Renew Your Business and Boost Your Bottom Line. “Rethinking” involves contemplating changing the current business model; “Reinventing” involves creating a new business model; and “Repositioning” involves transitioning from the old model to the new one.

The book describes the authors’ twelve strategies for organisational renewal, and then goes on to give advice on developing a short list of renewal candidates, obtaining commitment to the renewal process, structuring the reinvention phase, choosing the best renewal alternative, making the transition to the new business model, avoiding traps along the way, and building renewal capabilities into future leaders.

Much of the advice which the book gives and many of the strategies proposed will already be quite familiar to those who have read other business strategy books. Perhaps the authors’ particular combination of strategies is unique, but the real strength of the book lies in the clarity and simplicity with which the strategic process is described, rather than in the novelty of the ideas proposed. I would recommend this book to anyone whose organisation needs a strategic boost to counter declining levels of success.

http://www.grahamjeffery.com/

Friday, 25 June 2010

Rethink Reinvent Reposition, by former colleague Leo Hopf and William Welter is a great new book aimed at people looking at where to go next with a mature business: into decline, or onward and upward with renewal.

It avoids mathematics and analytics but is an excellent description of the decision analysis process applied to a difficult problem. The process of renewal is a complex one involving not just the brainstorming and analysis of opportunities, but also working with the emotions of all the people involved, inside and outside the organisation, and often deeply ingrained culture. Hopf and Welter offer 12 templates for strategic choices to start one thinking and then go on to provide an outline of the steps to make and embed the decisions whether and how to renew the business, and to start the process of making it happen.

The book is highly practical, with lots of list of things to do and think about, and traps to avoid. It also has lots of case studies stretching back over a century. The only slight drawback is that not all the case studies are listed in the index, so I am going to have to reread the book (probably not a bad thing) and take notes. I’d like to be able to quote some of the examples in my own work with clients.

In these difficult economic times, where maybe it’s not decline but survival that is at stake, following the advice in this book can be a business lifesaver.

See also:

• The book’s website: http://RethinkReinventReposition.com/
• The Institute for Management Studies who has named the volume its Book of the Month for July 2010.

The Institute for Management Studies has over 35 years in Executive Education and development.  They have selected our book as their book of the month to go out to 385 advisory members. This is good news in that the advisers are from the largest companies in about 25 cities in the US plus London and Brussels.

Many business books offer a few ideas, and then fill the remaining pages with repetitive descriptions. Not this book. It is packed with practical, step-by-step advice to help leaders work through the complex and often painful process of making profound changes in their organizations. In addition to the 12 strategies promised in the title, the book provides a model for analysis, decision-making and implementation. It illustrates these points through succinct, real-world case studies.

To pack this much information into one book, (clearly) the authors had to keep explanations brief. For this reason, casual readers may miss some simple, yet profound pieces of advice (on its own, the 5-page section “Ensuring Effective Dialogue Between Decision Makers and the Working Team” would create profound organizational change). To gain best value, I recommend readers stop frequently to review key points and consider how they would apply the advice in their organizations. There is a wealth of information here – a few extra minutes of reflection will reap significant rewards.

All businesses age.  But decline is not inevitable. If your business can successfully reinvent itself, it may be destined not just for a new lease on life but to transform your industry

Leo Hopf and Bill Welter’s new book “Rethink, Reinvent, Reposition: 12 Strategies to Renew Your Business and Boost Your Bottom Line” presents a simple yet effective framework for renewal in today’s business environment.  It describes the process and tools with which leadership teams at all levels can renew their businesses and watch growth and margins soar.

This book presents twelve proven solutions for business renewal with multiple business examples of each. Among these are:

• Catch the New Wave:  Shift your current business to the next hot thing (i.e., the wii controller in video games)
• Make a Time Shift:  Do business during a new or different part of the day to reach different customers (i.e., Chex party mix creates demand for breakfast cereal in the evenings)
• Shift to the Sweet Spot:  Look at the value chain and develop offerings in the most attractive parts of the chain (i.e., Qualcomm moving from commodity contract research into developing its own patents to control cell phone CDMA technology)
• Cash Out and Double Down:  Sell some of your business units so you can focus on the one or more that has the most promise of success (i.e., Eli Lilly selling its Guidant medical device company to fund its core pharmaceutical business)

Hopf and Welter include a renewal diagnostic for identifying which parts of your business need to be renewed and which do not.  And they show you how to build renewal and transformation capabilities in your next generation of leaders.

Mr. Hopf teaches “Decision Making in Organizations” to graduate students in the Management Science and Engineering department at Stanford University.  He teaches similar topics to executives at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Business where he has been named a Fellow of Executive Education.  He is the author of the book “Rethink, Reinvent, Reposition:  12 Strategies to Renew Your Business and Boost Your Bottom Line.”

He was the Managing Director of Strategic Decisions Group’s (SDG’s) 70-person home office in Menlo Park, CA, and served on the SDG Executive Committee.  SDG, a profitable and growing management consulting firm, has been dedicated for over three decades to helping companies create superior shareholder return and achieve lasting change.  In his 13 years with SDG, Mr. Hopf led corporate portfolio strategies and guided execution efforts.  His work encompassed both the search for higher value alternatives and the creation of lasting organizational alignment and commitment to the selected alternatives.

Mr. Hopf’s client engagements have included strategy retreats for CEOs and their executive teams, organizational transformation sessions with company leaders and managers, and facilitation of 25 CEOs in a day-long session to agree on policy for their industry lobbying efforts.  He has also led efforts to design the decision making and strategic planning processes for five of the Fortune 100 largest companies.  His work has included numerous complex, multiple-owner joint ventures, in which several parties with differing beliefs and values all had to agree on a particular course of action.

Mr. Hopf has worked in a variety of business sectors: medical devices, telecommunications, upstream and downstream oil & gas, pulp and paper, chemicals, mining, engineering and construction, building products, pharmaceuticals, banking, office products distribution, high-tech materials, remote sensing, travel, and health care.  He has led major consulting engagements in Indonesia, Singapore, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and Kuwait.

Mr. Hopf is also an active angel investor and is a member of the Band of Angels in Silicon Valley.  He has served on the Board of Directors and the Board of Advisors for numerous startups and has delivered the keynote address at a conference for raising funds for new ventures.

Mr. Hopf earned a Masters of Business Administration degree with highest distinction from the Amos Tuck School, and has B.S. degrees in Chemical Engineering and in Metallurgical Engineering from the University of Minnesota.  He received the Walter Jacobs Prize for inspiring confidence and enthusiasm amongst his peers at Tuck.

Click the link below to download Leo’s full bio.

Leo Hopf bio 20100429

Being prepared for the future served as the platform for his first book, The Prepared Mind of a Leader: Eight Skills Leaders Use to Innovate, Make Decisions, and Solve Problems (published by Jossey-Bass in 2006). The book presents an original and proven method that will engender new approaches to business innovation, strategy, change, and problem solving. Drawing upon his more than 40 years of experience working with high level managers and directors at major companies and professional service firms, Welter’s book includes tested exercises in each of this eight skill areas, case examples, sidebar anecdotes, and mini-tests that challenge the reader to practice and fine-tune their leadership skills and approaches.

Since then, Bill has published a small workbook, MindLab: a Place to Think, with a month’s worth of exercise to improve thinking. His third book, written with Leo Hopf, is titled Rethink, Reinvent, Reposition: 12 Strategies to Renew Your Business and Boost Your Profits and will be published by Adams Media in 2010.

Bill received a B.S. degree from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and an M.B.A. degree from DePaul University. He is a Fellow in Executive Education at the Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota. Mr. Welter has worked for such companies as Stewart Warner, UARCO, Ernst & Whinney, Austin Consulting, Ernst & Young, DePaul University, Strategic Management Group, and Adaptive Strategies, Inc. as an engineer, consultant, and professional education trainer. He also served as an adjunct lecturer at the Kellstadt Graduate School of Business, DePaul University, for five years.

His consulting experience has ranged from leading the design of a manufacturing operation for a major aerospace company to facilitating a global manufacturing strategy for a large pharmaceutical company to counseling decision makers in long-term strategic planning. Mr. Welter also is a frequent speaker on leadership and management topics at workshops, organization summits, and retreats for businesses in domestic and global location.