It's been a recognized axiom for almost a century: An enterprise's scarcest asset is its executives' time. That's still true. It's what you should spend your time on that changes as the structure of the economy changes that is critical to understand.

This month's white paper, The Proper Use of An Executive's Time considers that important issue.

"Oh, I don't think we'd be interested in that; we already have all the 'teaming' we need." A not unusual response to our queries regarding prospects' interests in our Teamformance (the productive integration of effective team formation with optimum performance) program.

"Teaming?" What does that mean? Is that rather like saying that they, too, have joined the latest management fad club? Or, is it more measurably specific, the empowerment equivalent of the quality management shibboleth of becoming "ISO 9000 registered"? The point here is that ISO 9000 registration guarantees neither results or quality. It simply says that the registrant has the right documented processes in place, which should produce the desired results . . . as long as all the contingencies were covered and all the executions were spot on. You've improved the odds of success a bit in your favor, but who signed the guarantee?

One of the current issues with successful team formation and performance, what we call Teamformance, is the overall environment in which the team will operate. The virtual explosion of mergers, acquisitions, consolidations, divestitures, closings, transfers and the like, cast a long shadow on team based performance. Which current team members will still be around to see the conclusion of the task or the implementation of the process? And what of the task or process itself; will it still be around?

Different strokes for the new management folks, and the differences are coming faster and with ever increasing demands for immediate performance. Instant gratification, any way we can get it.

So in the rush for quicker, more creative and innovative performance in more stressful environments (if you're not feeling this, you're either living under a rock or you are the rock), how can teams really live up to their expectations; not just survive as individual members, but get their job done?

One approach might be to not undertake any team project requiring more than the average turnover period per employee, i.e., if the average longevity is say, thirteen months, there's your maximum allowable project period. While this may not be too bad for tactical projects, tasks such as vision installation, corporate realignment, organization re-engineering, and strategy redevelopment, to name but a few, may fall outside the allowable time limit.

Again, what's the culture and environment in which the team will be expected to perform? Frequent, rapid, and comprehensive change all place urgent dynamics on the aspects of TeamFormance. In one organization this writer was associated with, the company (really, the chief shaker and maker) reorganized about every ten months, thereby largely invalidating the so-called annual plan and strategy program - and the three and five-year long range plans as well - so recently put in place. New teams would be formed to put forth and execute the new view. It got to be that if anything started to push out over six months from the start date, not only did everyone involved become increasingly nervous, but a group psychology began to emerge of "Why bother; we'll all get reorganized within another couple of months anyway, so what's the use?" thereby creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. For this organization, the result was that it lost its position as the world leader in design, manufacturing, and marketing for its particular technology. Not only was the leadership position never regained, the company slipped into the abyss with increasing acceleration. Simply, its competitors with a committed view to the long term, ate its lunch and eventually stole the picnic table too.

When reflecting on the contemporary management practices of "teaming" (that word again) and incessant reorganization, it is prophetic to recall the words of one who saw the issue clearly, long before "organization theory," re-engineering, and team building became a universal management topic:

"Every time we were beginning to form up into teams, we would be reorganized. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganization, and a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while producing confusion, inefficiency, and demoralization."

- Petronius Arbiter, AD 65

We ran across two interesting studies on customer loyalty we wanted to share.

According to a study done last year by the Strativity Group, 45% of executives conceded their corporations did not deserve the loyalty of their customers. At about the same time, the Mercer Group did a study that showed that 71% of executives acknowledged that better meeting customer needs was a high priority. This was up from the same study done two years ago, when 56% of executives felt this way.

If you want to gain a competitive advantage, you need to consistently create and keep customer loyalty. It's just that simple ... and just that tough.

email: mgooze@customermfg.com

phone: 408.987.0140

web: http://customermanufacturing.com