MONTHLY
vol. I , issue #2
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innovation & enterprise performance
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!! COOL !!
How about something that's way better than cool? How about so cool, it's cryogenically frozen at -320°F? That would be Dippin’ Dots® - tiny bead-like formations of ice cream. Invented by Curt Jones, a microbiologist in Louisville KY, who tried the process for freezing bacteria as a way to make ice cream, the "Dots" are actually made by dripping ice cream batter into a vat of liquid nitrogen. This instantly locks the particular flavor and freshness into the frozen beads and gives them a shelf life of 3 years. The Dots are stored at -40°F – which allows them to be easily scooped and poured. Even cooler, is the surprising "mouth feel" (a technical term borrowed from the world of chocolate) of the super-cold beads when they melt on your tongue. Founded in 1988, Dippin’ Dots was recently ranked by Entrepreneur magazine as 69th among the top 100 fastest-growing franchises. Cool!
PREDICTION:
Someday, in the not-so-distant future, you will find Dippin' Dots® in your Happy Meal at the McDonald's drive-thru. Children will not care about the microbiological science behind their novel treat, although somewhere at least one child's college education will be paid for by revenue gleaned from the sale of Dippin' Dots®.
Most people miss
opportunity because
it's dressed in overalls
& looks like work
- Thomas Edison
PRESCRIPTION
The ability to stop projects is the ability to free up precious resources. If you are not able to put an end to projects gone bad, you will have no resources with which to start new paths.
Brakes let you go fast
The ability to complete more of the right things depends on critical decisions about what not to do.
PRODUCT MAP
INCREASES LEVERAGE This is the second of a six-part series on using Product & Service Mapping as a process for bolstering enterprise performance.
Last month we discussed the difficulties corporations now face in maintaining and improving financial performance. We also introduced the concept of Product and Service "Maps." as the first step in a practical, actionable plan for sustainable growth through greater
leverage and improved efficiency.
In review, Midior's recommended plan for initiating a program that will accelerate growth consists of 5 steps: The first critical success factor for this type of change initiative is to establish a common foundation from which the team will work. In this case, getting an organization to have a consistent view of its complete product or service portfolio. While this may at first seem like a simple exercise, especially in manufacturing environments - there are many complexities that show up once
you scratch the surface. Most management systems are able to generate
reports that show the financial view of operations, and org charts can easily show how personnel are organized by department - it is rare to find a single view of product and service offerings that crosses market segments and organizational boundaries. In particular, it is rare to find a system that can report on both detail and summary levels. We have found that the process of building an inventory of products and services AND capturing relationships and dependencies on underlying technology platforms, service elements and operating capacity is a very revealing first step. In addition, having a way to visually define, organize and capture the relationships between those products
and services, business units and customer segments is the beginning of establishing common ground and making problems and opportunities immediately visible.
We call this process "Product or Service Mapping." The process of building a product or service map starts with taking an inventory across different parts of the organization. What are the products "built" according to manufacturing? What are the products "sold" according to sales? What are the products "supported" according to customer service? What are the products "designed" according to product development?
In today's sophisticated environment of complex platforms, shared components, and complex service offerings there is not always even a consistent definition of what the products are. Consider your local telephone company. What does their product portfolio look like? There is dial tone (residential, business, and wholesale), multiple long distance offerings, cellular services in various packages and combinations with the others, a variety of add-on services like voice-mail, call forwarding, call waiting, call blocking, etc that also have some relationship to the others, and all that is before even thinking about data services. So putting together the puzzle that connects all those offerings with their target market segments and with their underlying infrastructure (does residential dial-tone use the same billing system as commercial long distance?) is no small challenge. In fact, a company may actually have hundreds of "named" offerings depending on where you look and whom you talk to. And different parts of the company may call different things products/features/service levels/infrastructure, etc. Getting sales people, marketing, operations, management and technical staff to speak the same language internalize the same "product view" of the business is the first measure of success - and a requirement for any Product-Map.
The bulk of this inventory can be gathered from databases around the company, but the most valuable information will come from interviews with individuals around the organization who can use their own language for what is and isn't a product.
The scope of this endeavor can often resemble a cultural revolution that begins with the effort to derive a common language according to product or service "functionality." This means that in some cases, decades old business unit nomenclature is destined for the history books. For those with a vested interest in the product's history and development, this is no small matter. For example, while in many cases, particular naming conventions may have developed through simple arbitrary decisions, changing them can evoke emotional conflicts.
Of course there is more to Product/Service Map than just rationalizing naming conventions. The real challenge is to devise a construct - or map - for categorizing the various products and services without losing the implied relationships between those offerings and the business units in which they are currently leveraged.
A three-dimensional object - we like to use the metaphor of a cylinder - addresses the challenge of categorizing all global products and services and links them to the core corporate capabilities and market segments. The choice of a 3-D construct enables a visualization that can generate many different views and insights into the relationships between products, business units, and customer segments. A Product or Service Map can be manipulated to offer managers:
When working with individual business leaders, this visual product map enables meaningful dialog about problems, opportunities, priorities and resource allocation. Strategically, business leaders gain new insight because they can begin to see their area within a broader context. A visual Product/Service Map supports managers in the planning process as they consider next-generation products and services based on the gaps that are now visible. The Product Map also exposes overlaps in product line offerings and enables managers to devise immediate, actionable plans for rationalization based on overlaps.
In next month's issue, we will discuss the second step in our plan, the importance of building a product-oriented discipline and culture.
Thank you for reading all the way to the end and we look forward to seeing you next month. In the interim, if you have
any comments or opinions you'd like to share, please click here.