Companies need impulses from outside

Consequently, the contracted strategy process includes both an external market assessment of the B2B and retail market segments, as well as an innovative customer segmentation for the B2B business. This ensures that existing hypotheses, observations, and evaluations are critically questioned and prevailing blind spots are revealed within the internal market assessment.

Der Beitrag Family businesses have a different logic erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.

Innovation is born through creativity and change. In order to capitalize on both of these factors, a company needs a culture that encourages open-mindedness and commitment. A suitable company culture is crucial for success, yet most companies do not really understand their own company culture.

Understanding company culture

Culture is hard to grasp – as is demonstrated by the existence of numerous diverging definitions. Drawing on insights from systemic theory and leading research on organizational culture, our concept of the Systemic Culture Compass cuts through the fog and enables companies to effectively identify, analyze, and adapt their company culture in order to ensure sustainable innovation.

Changing your own company culture

An organization’s culture tends to be either internally- or externally oriented. In addition, there is usually a focus on either flexibility or stability. With the Systemic Culture Compass you can identify the position of your company and derive implications for concrete action plans. This is the first step towards an effective cultural change and reliable innovation.

Do you want to learn more?

Do you want to learn more about the topic? Please fill out the following contact form to receive further information or schedule a free, personal online dialog to see our references and practical examples of our current projects.

Der Beitrag Making company culture tangible erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.

The current challenges like currency crisis, stagnation, shortage of skilled workers, digitalization, complexity and volatility are all placing new demands, also on your management.

In future, leadership will be more about navigating than steering. Enabling is in the focus. It means to open up spaces, create opportunities and offer support to enable employees to largely organize themselves. Courage is the most important prerequisite for an open intrapreneurship culture. This includes frameworks and incentives like role models, higher tolerance for errors and a comprehensive understanding of innovation and innovation systems. Future Institute | Leadership Report 2016.

In order to meet this objective, suitable organizational structures, modern learning architectures and interactive learning platforms, which enable the formation and strengthening of neural networks of your management are required. Neuro Leadership is the keyword – with a focus on attitude and not behavior!

We have integrated these aspects into our NEXT-GEN Leadership concept.

Request further information on the NEXT-GEN Leadership concept free of charge

Der Beitrag NEXT-GEN-Leadership: Thinking and acting with confidence erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.

Der Beitrag The digitalization in the consulting business is unstoppable erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.

We would like to thank you for your greetings and wishes from all over the world. On the occasion of our reopening event, we had a wonderful evening in our new domicile, as the pictures show.

We are sure that we will experience more great evenings with our friends and customers in this inspiring surrounding.

Learn more about our activities in China

Interesting Links:

• Chinese Delegation invited by the Robert Bosch Stiftung
• 3rd Lecture at ECNU: Systems and their Relevant Environments
• transformis® supports Initiative of Chinese Government

Der Beitrag Re-Opening Event of transformis® Office Shanghai erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.

We thank Hanhan Jia

Ms. Jia, who will continue to provide us with advice and support on administrative issues, has over the last years earn special merits for her work at S&P. In her role as Office Manager, she oversaw the opening of our Shanghai office in 2011 and presided over its expansion in 2013. She has always shown great enthusiasm and has generated valuable benefits for both our customers and our company. With her intercultural experience, her communication skills in five languages and her determined but gentile appearance, Ms. Jia proved to be an extraordinary colleague and a respected business partner.

We thank Ms. Jia for her loyalty and commitment. For personal reasons, she has decided to scale back her career. We wish her and Mr. Zhang all the best, both personally and professionally. We also want to express our delighted to have found someone among our own colleagues to take on the challenging work in Shanghai.

Interesting articles

• Appointment as a Guest Professor in Shanghai
• Lecture During the Winter Semester 2014 at ECNU
• First lecture at ECNU in Shanghai
• First PERFORMANCE SIMULATOR® Workshop at ECNU
• First pilot project started: E-learning platform in China
• PERFORMANCE SIMULATOR®: Further pilot projects have begun

Der Beitrag Yiqing Zhang becomes new GM in Shanghai erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.

The long-term program started in 2015 under the title “Technology Changes Teaching”. It focuses on five key-topics:

• How can digital media support students in individual self-learning processes?
• What relevance does the variety of modern information media have for school routines?
• How can information technologies be effectively applied in schools?
• How can information technologies and their application improve the learning experience of individual students?
• Which options concerning knowledge-checks and performance measurements do modern Learning Management Systems and E-Learning Tools offer?

transformis® is proud to support this demanding program with its purpose built PERFORMANCE SIMULATOR®. Since 2013 we run the “ECNU-S&P Research Center for ICT-Enabled Systemic Changes and Innovations“ in Shanghai, in cooperation with the East China Normal University (ECNU) – a first-rate pedagogic university in China. The goal of the ECNU-S&P Research Center is the development and validation of appropriate concepts, models and methods in order to effectively implement modern information- and communication technologies within the framework of organizational change processes in the Chinese educational system.

The first tool to be developed, PERFORMANCE SIMULATOR® „Technology changes Teaching”, is currently being produced and will be made available for Chinese teachers throughout the country across various learning management systems as part of the reform project of the Chinese ministry of education

Making-Of

In cooperation with educational experts from ECNU, we developed critical situations for the application of information technology in the classroom, simulated them in video-based scenes and transformed them into an E-learning tool. The Chinese teachers taking part in the project will have the opportunity to study and evaluate these simulations. Neurological studies support this approach. In contrast to theoretical material, the simulated critical situations directly confront the teachers with possible opportunities and problems concerning the application of information technology in the classroom. They experience the situation as if they were actually happening. We are confident that the teachers can show a learning curve throughout the program, thereby directly contributing to the effective application of information technology in classrooms and ultimately increase sustained learning performance for students.

The program is taken up by the state and will be applied nationwide. It will function as a powerful tool to fulfill the goal of a long-term qualitative increase in the Chinese educational system.

Der Beitrag transformis® supports Initiative of Chinese Government erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.

First to be honored by Robert A. Sedlák was Nina Wetzel who, in her 25 years working for SEDÁK & PARTNER, was a major influence in carrying the company forward towards where it is today. Her excellent performance was unanimously recognized by her colleagues with a long round of applause.

Next in line was Adrian Lindel, who was honored for his 10 years with S&P during which he has established himself as a pillar of front office work. Robert Sedlák especially expressed his gratitude for the reliable and cooperative way Mr. Lindel has handled communication with important clients as well as the other tasks of front office work.

Finally, Markus Peterhänsel was honored for his 10 year jubilee within the company. Mr. Sedlák especially stressed the significance Mr. Peterhänsel has had on the conceptual development of the company’s current strategy process.

Der Beitrag 45 Years of transformis® Experience erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.

What are the implications for the management?

Since an organization’s environment typically has a cumulatively higher complexity than can be displayed within its own organizational structure, organizations need to reduce complexity by selecting relevant environments, thereby allowing them to remain stable and active systems. It is the responsibility of the management to ensure that relevant information is carried in from the outside and effectively contributes to the communication and decision processes.

Figure 1: Reduction of Complexity in Organizations

Organizations are complex social systems

Is it possible to steer a social system?

With regards to cause-and-effect chains, it is impossible to directly influence social systems. Organization can be irritated by their relevant environments, but they cannot be directly forced to adapt. Social systems use their boundaries to provide themselves with a certain amount of irritations, which can – but do not have to – provide impulses for the development of internal structures. When trying to directly steer organizations, thereby intervening in a running system, surprises are to be expected. Organizations cannot be directly controlled. They can only be indirectly changed through recursive leadership processes – through observations and their evaluations as well as from impulses derived from these considerations.

Organizations do not see what they do not see

How can blind spots be reduced?

Current observation and evaluation patterns are the result of an organization’s past learning and survival process .  “This self-confirmation process of observing through the results of these very observations leads to an internal buildup of stable meanings within the organization. The process concentrates situational judgments into solid patterns of explanation and interpretation, which cannot be easily challenged later, even in light of diverging experiences.“ (Wimmer, 1999) This mechanism can only be interrupted through successful irritations via structural coupling in which the irritations are perceived as relevant and therefore stimulate structural change.

Organizations have to invent their own future

How is this possible?

The future is and always will be uncertain. The calculability and predictability paradigm is continuously dissolving. Based on the assumption of a common trend, companies need to develop and agree upon an action plan for future adaptation through change. Furthermore, companies need to develop routines to constantly scrutinize and adapt their action plan based on observable developments in both the market and the broader organizational environment.

Figure 2: Meta Reflection – Strategy includes Reflection and Action

Three relevant core questions:

• How can an organization supply itself with more variation, thereby allowing it to identify opportunities?
• How can variations be identified from the input of the selection process?
• How can inter-organizational resistance against innovation be reduced in order to enable successful implementation?

The concept of forward-looking self-renewal

How can it be realized?

Environmental conditions change quickly. Markets become increasingly volatile. Unless specifically empowered, organizations struggle to keep up the pace of necessary adaptation. This is where the notion of forward-looking self-renewal becomes important. As a concept for intervention, this utilizes both basic organization specific assumptions as well as the design dimensions inherent to the theory of self-developing systems.

The target is therefore to further develop the evolutionary processes already existing within organizations: variation, selection, re-stabilization. The influence from the variation mechanism provides the organization with a bigger pool of potential development impulses. These makes up the necessary foundation to decide whether there are sufficient reasons to seriously change the organization, or if the status quo should be maintained (change vs. continuation). To refine the selection mechanism means to empower the leadership system, thereby enabling it to effectively observe both the organization and its environment in order to identify the innovations to be used for the further development of the organization. This leadership process requires communication. Re-stabilization addresses the task of transforming the change impulses into stable, established processing routines.

Do you want to learn more?

Do you want to learn more about the topic? Please fill out the following contact form to receive further information or schedule a free, personal online dialog to see our references and practical examples of our current projects.

Source:
Wimmer, R. (1999): Wozu benötigen wir Berater? Ein Orientierungsversuch aus Systemischer Sicht. In Achatzi H. J., Benkert, W. & Walger, G. Formen der Unternehmensberatung. Köln: Otto-Schmidt Verlag.

Der Beitrag Overcome organizational blindness erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.

Customer Segmentation is a specific construction of reality, heavily influenced by an organizational understanding that has developed over time. Oftentimes this understanding goes unquestioned for too long, resulting in a situation where Value Propositions do not address the requirements and expectations of existing and potential customers. What was once right may now be outdated – and in the end the price is the only differentiating criterion.

[one_half]

[/one_half]

[one_half_last]

[/one_half_last]

Our practical examples show that size, branch, location, revenue, and profit margin are the wrong selection criteria to determine suitable Value Propositions. Not every major client has the same expectations. Other selection criteria are necessary to develop Value Propositions that really meet the needs and wants of strategic target groups.

Do you want to learn more?

Over the past years we developed a completely new Customer Segmentation concept, which sets us apart from the competition. If you are interested in learning more about the Innovative Customer Segmentation, simply use the following contact form to request free information. We will gladly present our procedure with current practical examples in a personal online dialogue.

Der Beitrag Innovative Customer Segmentation Opens Up New Business Opportunities erschien zuerst auf transformis Consulting SE.