Posted by business901 on May 30, 2011
Value Networks and the true nature of collaboration by Verna Allee with Oliver Schwabe is a digital edition book located at http://www.valuenetworksandcollaboration.com. From the book: 
Work life is completely changing as social networking and collaboration platforms allow a more human-centric way of organizing work. Yet work design tools, structures, processes, and systems are not evolving as rapidly, and in many cases are simply inadequate to support the new flexible and networked ways of working.
Value Networks and the true nature of collaboration meets this challenge head on with a systemic, human-network approach to managing business operations and ecosystems. Value network modeling and analytics provide better support for collaborative, emergent work and complex activities.
Verna Allee, M.A., is Co-founder and CEO of Value Networks LLC, located at ValueNetworks.com. Verna was my guest on the Business901 Podcast and we discussed the history of knowledge management and how her work has evolved into value networks. Value Network philosophies also apply to Lean, Agile and into sales and marketing arena. I find this area fascinating as we rid ourselves of hierarchy, positions and titles and delve into that mysterious area of roles!
About Verna Allee: Verna has more than twenty years of deep experience in value networks, intangibles, knowledge management, and new business models. She has been a trusted advisor to more than 100 Fortune 1000 companies and has led government agencies, civil society organizations, and entrepreneurial startups in tapping intangible value for increased efficiency and competitive advantage.
Another comment from the book:
Value Network Analysis is an invaluable tool for anyone working with inter-organizational networks in particular. Its use of roles and exchanges produces a visual, thinking and conversation analysis that finally moves us fully into the network age. – Steve Waddell, Founder Networking Action
I recommend this Verna Allee book, The Future of Knowledge: Increasing Prosperity through Value Networks
for reference and to grasp a better business aspect of Knowledge and Value Networks.
Related Information: Pair Problem Solving in the Workplace Business Processes as Value Networks The Role of PDCA in a Lean Sales and Marketing Cycle The New Knowledge Management Game eBook
Posted by business901 on May 23, 2011
Whether we call it PDCA Lean Startup, Agile or Scrum. author Peter Sims believes this shift from slow, calculated execution to rapid, low-risk iteration has fundamentally remade business. His book, Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge from Small Discoveries
explores how companies are using these ideas to achieve big things. Peter provides examples from Kid Rock to General Motors in an enjoyable and easy read. However, when you look under the hood Little Bets is grounded in an amazing amount of research. 
In the Business901 podcast, I had the opportunity to speak with Sims about the concept, and how it related and differed from the typical PDCA methodology. The relationship of iteration and Lean by Doing is very apparent and the author feels that the Lean community is on the verge of some remarkable breakthroughs at their next level of performance.
Peter Sims is an author, speaker, and entrepreneur. He was the coauthor with Bill George of the Wall Street Journal and BusinessWeek bestselling book True North
. His articles have appeared in Harvard Business Review, Tech Crunch, The Financial Times, and as an expert blogger for Fast Company.
Related Information:
Improve your Sales Cycle, Work on your Feedback Loops
The Little PDCA Sales Loop
Power of Check = The Pivot in PDCA
The Role of PDCA in a Lean Sales and Marketing Cycle
Posted by business901 on May 16, 2011
Wouldn't it be great to be able to connect all your marketing activities to their impact on sales revenue? Wouldn't it be great to remove the guesswork from your marketing? Over the last 20 years, Guy Powell of demand ROMI has done just that in senior level sales & marketing across the globe both on the client and consulting sides.
Guy is a marketing measurement expert and has been measuring the effectiveness of social media right from the start. Guy states, “We can’t measure the effect of social media as a stand-alone media. Social media has a unique impact on consumer behavior but we need to realize that it also affects the impact of traditional media and traditional media impacts the effect of social media.” Our podcast discusses the interaction between the two.
P.S. Very tempted to make an A3 out of this!!!
Guy’s Books include:
ROI of Social Media: How to Improve the Return on Your Social Marketing Investment
Marketing Calculator: Measuring and Managing Return on Marketing Investment
Return on Marketing Investment
Related Information:
Why Social Media is so Lean
Lead Generation through the Lean Marketing Lens
Why does sales and marketing operate to a different quality standard?
The Future of Marketing is Lean
Posted by business901 on May 9, 2011
On the Business901 podcast, Lindsay Jackson Nichols discussed the business benefits of ISO Certification and how it can be used in conjunction with continuous improvement. Lindsay is the CEO of MOCG, a management consulting firm specializing in implementing process improvement and ISO based management systems. 
When you first think about, you may think that Quality Management and a continuous improvement methodology like Lean are one in the same. You may also think that they are willing partners. Many disagree with that thought. My thoughts are that I find the ISO standards as a way to involve people from all departments to ask them how you do things. As a result, procedures and documentation are created to evaluate the current method of doing things (the first step in standard work) against the requirements of a standard (ISO). As a result, you develop performance gaps for continuous improvement. Others believe that this would hinder the development and flexibility of standard work documents and prefer that they are divorced from each other.
I probed this question with Lindsay and on a Lean Blog Post on Standard Work. The answer I believe to be correct is that ISO 9001 should not be the continuous improvement strategy just that it should be one metric by which continuous improvement is measured. However, I still believe using ISO as a standard to start the process of developing standard work is not a bad place to start.
About LJ Nichols: Lindsay’s career has been entirely devoted to management consulting, working with Grant Thornton LLP - the fifth largest accounting and management consulting firm in the nation, assisting them develop a ‘center of excellence’ for their quality, environment and regulatory practice, and P-E International plc/P-E Handley Walker the largest management consulting firm in Europe, where she was integral in establishing their ISO presence in the US.
Related Information:
Agreeing on Standards in a Lean Enterprise
Is Standard Work needed in Sales and Marketing?
Where is the path in Continuous Improvement for Sales and Marketing?
Why does sales and marketing operate to a different quality standard?
Posted by business901 on May 2, 2011
James Franz is the co-author with Jeffrey K. Liker on the latest of the Toyota Way books:The Toyota Way to Continuous Improvement: Linking Strategy and Operational Excellence to Achieve Superior Performance 
. Jim was my guest on the Business901 podcast and if you have been spending your time improving your processes and wondering why they are not giving you the expected returns, this is the podcast for you.
James Franz has over 24 years of manufacturing experience and learned lean as a Toyota Production Engineer in Japan. He started at the Motomachi plant and then moved to NUMMI and then finally worked in Georgetown, Kentucky. After leaving Toyota, he then went to Ford to apply his lean knowledge beginning in production engineering. He was sent to Ford of Australia for 3 years and led their Stamping, Assembly, Casting, and Powertrain facilities to global leadership in lean for Ford. Jim also teaches for the University of Michigan’s Center for Professional Development’s Lean Certification course.
About the Toyota Way Academy: The Academy’s mission is to teach the Toyota Way using the Toyota Way for more information visit: www.toyotawayacademy.com
Related Information:
Coaching Lean eBook with Dr. Liker
Dr. Jeff Liker on PDCA and Lean Culture>
PDCA for Lean Marketing, Knowledge Creation
Understand Scrum, Understand Implementing PDCA
