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Tom Peters Times - November 2007 | | | Navigation in Turbulent Times
Tom Peters enthralled his London audiences last week talking about his 25-year journey "in search of excellence." The BHAGs (Big Hairy Audacious Goals) (thank you, Jim Collins, for the term) of personal and business excellence remain much the same in 2007 as they were in 1982. But the context in which we have to operate is completely different. It's definitely "not your father's world" and "apparently it's not your/my world either!" according to Tom. (Get the London Business Forum, 30 Oct, slides.)
For those determined to achieve personal and business excellence, the urgent advice from Tom Peters and Tom Peters Company alike would be "To get going, get going!" But, how to compile an agenda, what to focus on over the next three to five years, and what to start doing now are difficult enough for individuals to decide, let alone those who have to get others to join them.
Tom's advice has consistently pointed to Professional Service Firms as providing the best indication of what future business excellence looks like. "The PSF is the model that will help you to get out of the commoditized box that you're stuck in," Tom said, "focus more on customer experience and emotional value add, and less on cost reduction." Victory, in Nelsonian terms at least, will go to those who can put their anxiety to win ahead of their fear of losing!
Building on Tom's writing and our learnings from those who have taken the PSF message seriously in their organizations, Tom Peters Company has developed a package that helps businesses to get in shape for the competitive battles that lie ahead. The premise is that future success will come to those who create a context in which their talent can create more value for customers than their competitors' talent can. Called the Future Shape of the Winner, the approach aligns and balances six elements of future business success; respectively, ambition and performance, brand and experience, and architecture and execution, around the key seventh element: Talented People!
To "get going" with this approach, we have created a new type of diagnostic, the Navigation Aid. Its function, rather like Nelson's compass or an astronaut's gyroscope, is to help clients to set off in the direction they have chosen, and to adjust course quickly when turbulence en route takes them off course. It's a tool that helps people to look forward and see the possibilities of the future rather than relying on and repeating the mantras of the past. It helps them to stretch their ambitions, to compile and describe a future agenda that will engage and energize their people, and to use this combination to move their business forward.
In Tom Peters Company, this is an evolving study of future business excellence, and we are keen to work with pioneering leaders who find themselves looking for a different direction. Could this be you?
For further details, click here.
Richard King
Managing Director, International
Tom Peters Company UK
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 | | Operation: Inspiration - Seeing the Possibilities of the Future 
Client Case Study: MWR
Re-imagining how to care for our Soldiers takes a cadre of dedicated and engaged employees. There is more to our Soldiers' lives than the uniform. So how does the Army take care of Soldiers?
What is MWR?
To the 34,000 Army Morale, Welfare, and Recreation (MWR) employees worldwide, there is no higher calling than taking care of the community of people who serve and stand ready to defend our nation. Who are the members of this community? They are Soldiers and their Families, Reserve, National Guard, civilian employees, retirees, and others. How do they do it? MWR serves the needs, interests, and responsibilities of each individual in the Army with a broad range of programs, from family, child, and youth services to recreation, sports, entertainment, travel, and leisure services. These programs and services enhance the quality of their lives for all of their lives, no matter where they are. Family and MWR programs are crucial to recruitment, readiness, and retention of our Army's Soldiers. (The strength of our Soldiers comes from the strength of their Families!)
The Problem to Be Re-imagined:
What keeps the MWR workforce up at night? The answer is participation and satisfaction with the programs they offer. Participating in the programs and satisfaction are crucial to keeping Soldiers in the Army and keeping them ready. How do you engage everyone - from the 18-year-old single Soldier, to the 30-year-old with a Family, their children, and the 65-year-old retiree on Army installations worldwide - in such a broad range of programs? One of these answers is in the programming and special events that get them participating.
What Has to Change?
If not energized, MWR programs can be old, tired, and routine - or as Tom would say, "Mundane!" Installations have fitness centers, bowling centers, golf courses, places to eat, and indoor and outdoor recreation facilities. However, if they offer the same old tired programs in these venues repeatedly, and don't pay attention to trends, demographics, and technology, participation and customer satisfaction drop. What they need is a culture of innovation and creativity that makes the Army community say WOW! every time they experience an MWR program or event!
What Is the Strategy for Change?
How do you create such a change in culture? Tom Peters' book Re-imagine inspired the MWR Academy (responsible for training the MWR workforce). They got hooked up to a WOW! Projects workshop. It energized them so much that they got some of their instructors certified to teach the WOW! Projects approach. Then, they began training over 300 MWR employees from 50 different Army installations worldwide, over a three-year period.
To continue reading this case study, click here.
Submitted by:
Valarie Willis, Principal
Tom Peters Company |
| | Top Tips
After many years' experience of helping our clients to put Tom's ideas into practice, here are some top tips from Tom Peters Company for those who have been inspired or provoked into action by Tom, perhaps after reading one of his books or attending one of his speeches.
1. Do something right away. Go back to your office and tell someone what you heard. Go to lunch with someone different and tell them. Reframe your tasks into WOW! Projects that are exciting and energizing. If you want WOW! outcomes, you need WOW! targets at the outset. Choose your language, written and spoken, very carefully. Be daring. Use hot words, words that stretch the imagination - your own and others'!
2. Work out precisely who you must recruit to the cause as co-conspirators, activists, and sponsors. You will need strong players in all three categories if you are going to get serious about executing on your daring ambition. Who do you need to do things, with you and for you? Who can give you advice and guidance? Who can be a source of energy or resources? Who can contribute those crazy ideas that will stretch your ambition even further? Set about winning converts, champions, and allies in all key constituencies.
3. Chunk up your big ambitions into small, defined and manageable WOW! Projects - and start working on them NOW! Now that you've arrived at your list of projects, tell everyone who is important to you, at work and in your private life, about them, and do this right away. Public commitment will kick you into taking action in those difficult or awkward areas that desperately need addressing! Appoint someone you know and trust to be your "deadline dragon" to keep you on track and bone honest with yourself on progress.
Why not join us in London on 16th November for a half-day workshop on the Future Shape of the Winner? We'll be discussing how to get serious about applying Tom's ideas in practice. For more information, click here.
Madeleine McGrath
Managing Director, International
Tom Peters Company UK |
| | New WOW!Store Item: 2008 Daily Calendar
Re-imagine! Business Excellence in 2008 Calendar
Since In Search of Excellence, Tom has WOW!ed us with his words of wisdom. This 2008 calendar highlights some of the most perceptive and provocative quotes from Tom's 25-year body of work. Presented in a daily format, this calendar is sure to provide you with inspiring ideas about the way you work.
Retail: $12.99.
To purchase or for more information, click here. |
| | Cool Friend: Matthew Kelly 
Matthew Kelly is an internationally acclaimed speaker and author and the founder and president of Floyd Consulting, a consulting firm founded on the belief that your organization can only become the-best-version-of itself if the people who drive your organization are striving to become the-best-version-of themselves®. Over the past decade, he has given more than 2,500 keynote presentations and seminars, and, in the process, spoken to three million people in fifty countries. Kelly has a passion for helping companies understand that developing their employees is the first step to achieving corporate goals, and he seems to effortlessly elevate and energize people to pursue the highest values of the human spirit and achieve their personal and professional goals.
His books have sold more than one million copies and have appeared on the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Publisher's Weekly, and numerous other best-seller lists. His titles include The Rhythm of Life: Living Every Day with Passion and Purpose, and The Seven Levels of Intimacy.
Bio adapted from floydconsulting.com.
Erik Hansen spoke to him about his latest book (Tom called it magnificent!), The Dream Manager. To read Matthew Kelly's Cool Friends interview, click here.
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(C) 2007 tompeters!company | | |
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