Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

KPI examples from the Lancaster University

Tuesday, November 1st, 2011

An interesting approach to using KPIs in the academic sector is provided by the Lancaster University, featured in smartKPIs.com’s KPI in practice section. Click on the image below for a larger view:

Source: http://www.lancs.ac.uk/vc/kpi.htm

For more details see the Lancaster University KPIs in practice record.

Twitter makes the junction with analytics and KPIs

Wednesday, July 13th, 2011

Source: BackType Blog

Twitter has acquired BackType, a social analytics platform that helps companies understand their social impact.

For Twitter this acquisition gives the ability to analyze its network of tweets. Twitter will help brands and agencies to understand the business impact of social media.  Analyzing the mass of comments and tweets surrounding a URL from around the Internet, Twitter will be able to demonstrate the value of a single link. From a marketing perspective, marketers will be able to track what elements are influencing their successes, they can measure, the  value of engagement,  the reach of their tweets and content and other KPIs such as revenue, page views, sing ups, downloads, sales and more.

The financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed, but it can be assumed that the value brought to the both companies is substantial. Twitter is now estimated at approximately $7 billion.

Additional resources

http://www.enterpriseappstoday.com/social-media/twitter-social-media-analytics.html

http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2011/07/05/twitters-new-7-billion-valuation-by-the-numbers/?mod=google_news_blog

http://blog.backtype.com/2011/07/backtype-has-been-acquired-by-twitter

Biodiversity, sustainability and performance

Saturday, July 9th, 2011

smartKPIs.com Performance Architect update 39/2011

Although widely unacknowledged, as declared by the United Nations, 2010 was the international year of biodiversity. It was meant to raise awareness in the fragile state of many species of plants and animals around the world and mobilize in safeguarding biodiversity.  There is much talk about climate change, however the profile of biodiversity as a world crisis is somehow overshadowed. Perhaps many made terms with the idea that more and more species and threatened and disappear: ”…well, there are plenty…there is not much we can do…someone will look after them..”.

While on the short term the impact of the disappearance of species may be small, the medium and long terms implications may be considerable. A recent example is the jellyfish invasion in many parts of the Sea of Japan and other parts of the world, attributed by many to the overfishing of small fish and the growth in dead ocean zones (portions of the ocean with depleted oxygen levels in water due to chemical unbalance). Around the world, biodiversity is an issue of alarming proportions. One hundred species per million are currently estimated to be lost per year (Rockstrom and others, 2009).

The 2010 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species estimates that:

  • 21 % of the total 5,491 described mammal species;
  • 12% of the total 9,998 described bird species;
  • 29% of the total 6,433 amphibian species;
  • 5% of the total 31,300 described fish species;
  • 5% of the total 9,084 described reptile species;
  • 3% of the total described 281,821 flowering plant species;
  • 29% of the total gymnosperms (conifers, cycads, Ginkgo and Gnetales) species

are deemed endangered or vulnerable to extinction. Due to the large number of plant species only 12,914 had an evaluation completed and of these 73% are considered threatened.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has been publishing the UNEP Year Book since 2003, which reports on new environmental science and recent developments in the environment. The latest report for 2010, outlines new research that illustrate the boundaries have been crossed for climate change, interference with the nitrogen cycle and mostly biodiversity loss, of the nine components of Earth systems that show signs of global environmental change driven by human activities.

Source: UNEP Year Book, 2010

The Global Biodiversity Outlook 3 report, published by the United Nations Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity in 2010, confirms something many already knew: the target set by world leaders in 2002, to achieve a significant reduction in the rate of biodiversity loss by 2010 was not met. In addition, the five principal pressures directly driving biodiversity loss (habitat change, overexploitation, pollution, invasive alien species and climate change) are either constant or increasing in intensity. The report also states that the ecological footprint of humanity exceeds the biological capacity of the Earth by a wider margin than at the time the 2010 target was agreed. Progress in addressing such challenges is slow and made mostly at policy and governance level, thus having a delayed impact on biodiversity. While at least 31 bird species (out of close to 10,000) would have become extinct in the past century, in the absence of conservation measures, by comparison the figure is small. Among the conclusions and recommendations of the report, several highlight the need to elevate the profile of biodiversity as a key concern not only for governments and institutions, but for organizations and individuals as well:

  • Better decisions for biodiversity must be made at all levels and in all sectors, in particular the major economic sectors, and government has a key enabling role to play.
  • We can no longer see the continued loss of and changes to biodiversity as an issue separate from the core concerns of society.
  • The action taken over the next decade or two, and the direction charted under the Convention on Biological Diversity, will determine whether the relatively stable environmental conditions on which human civilization has depended for the past 10,000 years will continue beyond this century. If we fail to use this opportunity, many ecosystems on the planet will move into new, unprecedented states in which the capacity to provide for the needs of present and future generations is highly uncertain.

Such developments highlight stronger than ever the need for more emphasis on sustainability at organizational level. As existing efforts seem to be not sufficient, among the questions that organizations should ask themselves are:

  • Is it our business?
  • What can we do more?
  • How can we contribute to addressing biodiversity loss?

Aurel Brudan
Performance Architect,
www.smartKPIs.com

Walker, Rob 1992, “Rank Xerox – Management Revolution”, Long Range Planning, Vol. 25, No. 1, pp. 9 to 21

smartKPIs.com performance management research reports and templates – EOAFY SALE

Friday, June 24th, 2011

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Over the last 12 months, smartKPIs.com experienced tremendous growth, in terms of content, services offered, community members and customers.
To celebrate the End of Australian Financial Year (EOAFY), smartKPIs.com is pleased to announce a limited time sale for its suite of research reports and performance management templates.

20-50% off, 7 days only!

Highlights of the smartKPIs.com End of Financial Year Sale include:

smartKPIs Premium (12 months complete access to over 6500 KPI examples, 1500 of them documented in 30 fields) – Normally $183 – Now only $138!

Top 20 KPIs of 2010 – Normally $20 – Now only $10!

Top 25 Local Government KPIs of 2010 – Normally $25 – Now only $19!

Top 25 Call Center KPIs of 2010 – Normally $25 – Now only $19!

Top 25 Information Technology KPIs of 2010 – Normally $25 – Now only $19!

HR Scorecard (prepopulated Excel template) – Normally $99 – Now only $79!

Sales Call Center Dashboard (prepopulated Excel template) – Normally $99 – Now only $79!

KPIs for Real Estate Agency Scorecard – Normally $25 – Now only $20!

KPIs for Real Estate Property Management Dashboard – Normally $25 – Now only $20!

HR Performance Management System Toolkit (bundle of HR templates) – Normally $249 – Now only $199!

Many new research reports and templates have been added over the last few weeks and are part of the sale.
For more details, visit reports
and templates pages.

Sale ends on 30 June 2011 and is restricted to the members of the smartKPIs.com community.

Top KPIs of 2010
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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 Accounting KPIs of 2010

Just released! With more than 220 KPI examples, Accounting is one of the main functional areas on smartKPIs.com Accounting has a long tradition in using KPIs, this making Accounting KPIs some…

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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 Customer Service KPIs of 2010

Just released!  Customer Service is for most organizations a key internal capability that requires close monitoring due to its impact on the business overall. smartKPIs.com contains close…

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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 Finance KPIs of 2010

Just released!   smartKPIs.com contains close to 200 Finance KPIs grouped by 5 subcategories: Asset / Portfolio Management, Financial Stability, Forecasts & Valuation, Liquidity and…

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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 HR KPIs of 2010

Just released! With over 350 HR KPI examples, the HR functional area is the third largest based on the number of documented KPIs and one of the most visited. Navigating through such a…

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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 Information Technology KPIs of 2010

With more than 550 KPI examples, Information Technology (IT) represents a core functional area on smartKPIs.com. While measurement is usually easy, KPI selection is often a challange….

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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 Knowledge Management KPIs of 2010

Just released!  Knowledge Management (KM) represents one of the core internal capabilities that can enhance organizational learning, knowledge development and generate competitive…

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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 Marketing KPIs of 2010

Just released!  Marketing is one of the more challanging functional areas for performance measurement intiatives, due to the variety of factors influencing outcomes. smartKPIs.com provides…

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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 Portfolio Management KPIs of 2010

Just released! Portfolio Management KPIs are essential for monitoring the health of organizational  initiatives. smartKPIs.com provides a wide diversity of rofolio and Project Management…

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Price:

$25 USD

Top 25 Project Management KPIs of 2010

Launching soon! The use of KPIs in Project Management is essential, due to the high proportion of projects implemented below expectations. Actively monitoring project health at the initiation…

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Price:

$25 USD

Top 25 Logistics and Distribution KPIs of 2010

Launching soon!  Logistics and Distribution is a sub-category in the Supply Chain, Procurement, Distribution functional area on smartKPIs.com, the second most well represented in terms of…

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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 R&D KPIs of 2010

Research & Development (R&D) KPIs are essential for tracking the performance of R&D programs. smartKPIs.com contains over 75 R&D KPI examples, with many other secondary…

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Price:

$25 USD

$19 USD

Top 25 Sales KPIs of 2010

Just released!  With more than 150 Sales KPI examples, the Sales Functional Area is one of the most representative categories on smartKPIs.com.  Selecting the right Sales KPI examples…

Pre-populated templates for HR
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Price:

$99 USD

$79 USD

HR Scorecard

The HR Scorecard is a ready-to-use tool, pre-populated with KPIs grouped by objectives and Balanced Scorecard perspectives. It illustrates the application of the Balanced Scorecard concept at…

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Price:

$25 USD

$20 USD

KPIs for HR Scorecard

KPIs for HR Scorecard contains the complete collection of KPIs that pre-populate the HR Performance Scorecard, in complete smartKPIs.com documentation form, ensuring a proper and facile use of…

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Price:

$99 USD

$79 USD

HR Dashboard

The HR Dashboard is a ready-to-use instrument for managing and measuring the contribution of the Human Resources function to the overall organizational performance. The tool contains a…

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Price:

$25 USD

$20 USD

KPIs for HR Dashboard

KPIs for HR Dashboard contains the complete collection of KPIs that pre-populate the HR Performance Dashboard, in complete smartKPIs.com documentation form, ensuring a proper and facile use…

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Price:

$249 USD

$199 USD

HR Performance Management System Toolkit

The HR Performance Management System Toolkit is a ready-to-use collection of pre-populated templates for managing performance of the HR department and monitoring its contribution to the overall…

Pre-populated templates for Call-Center
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Price:

$99 USD

$79 USD

Call Center Scorecard

The Call Center Scorecard is a ready-to-use tool, pre-populated with KPIs for the real estate industry, grouped by objectives and Balanced Scorecard perspectives. It illustrates the…

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Price:

$25 USD

$20 USD

KPIs for Call Center Scorecard

KPIs for Call Center Scorecard contains the complete collection of KPIs that pre-populate the Call Center Performance Scorecard, in complete smartKPIs.com documentation form, ensuring a…

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Price:

$99 USD

$79 USD

Sales Call Center Dashboard

The Sales Call Center Dashboard is a ready-to-use instrument for managing and measuring performance of Outbound Call Centers. The tool contains a repository of the most relevant and widely…

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Price:

$25 USD

$20 USD

KPIs for Sales Call Center Dashboard

KPIs for Sales Call Center Dashboard contains the complete collection of KPIs that pre-populate the Sales Call Center Performance Dashboard, in complete smartKPIs.com documentation form,…

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Price:

$99 USD

$79 USD

Customer Service Call Center Dashboard

The Customer Service Call Center Dashboard is a ready-to-use instrument for managing and measuring performance of Inbound Call Centers. The tool contains a repository of the most relevant and…

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Price:

$25 USD

$20 USD

KPIs for Customer Service Call Center Dashboard

KPIs for Customer Service Call Center Dashboard contains the complete collection of KPIs that pre-populate the Customer Service Call Center Performance Dashboard, in complete smartKPIs.com…

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Price:

$325 USD

$260 USD

Call Center Performance System Toolkit

The Call Center Performance Management System Toolkit is a ready-to-use collection of pre-populated templates for managing performance of Call Centers. The toolkit provides the…

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Measuring the performance of China’s Booming Skyscraper Industry

Monday, December 6th, 2010

Whist the recent financial crisis has caused most of the cities around the globe such as Chicago, Moscow and Dubai to put their plans for new skyscrapers on hold, China seems to be doing the exact opposite with more construction work being carried out (McDonald, 2010).

Riding on its country’s continuous economic boom, China’s construction industry seems to be flourishing, with many towering skyscrapers being erected or currently under construction in different parts of China over the last few years. Some of the notable skyscrapers include Shanghai Tower (Shanghai, under-construction), Kingkey Finance Centre (under-construction), China 117 Tower (Tianjin, under-construction), Guangzhou TV Tower (Guangzhou, completed), or Nanjing Greenland Financial Centre (Nanjing, completed).

Source: Trendir (2008)

The truth is that, excluding China, the year-on-year rate of growth in global construction activity sinks to almost zero. Construction activities in China itself in 2010 have actually contributed to almost 20% of the growth in global construction activity.

Source: CRU, WSD and Macquarie Research (2010)

The construction boom in China will have significant ripple effect across other industries, such as steel, building materials, power, metals, transport etc (Fernando, 2010). Therefore, with China currently leading the construction of skyscrapers around the globe, it is of interest to identify and monitor a few skyscraper construction related performance indicators in China.  This will provide better means to assess the performance of the skyscraper industry.

China’s Booming Skyscraper Industry: Facts and Figures

  • % Share of world 100 tallest buildings by country: 34% in China
  • % Share of world 100 tallest buildings by region: 45% in Asia
  • # Share of world 15 tallest buildings by country: 6 in China
  • # Share of world 10 tallest buildings under construction: 4 in China
  • # Number of stories/floors of building: Shanghai Tower 121 stories
  • # Height of tower: Shanghai Tower 632 meter
  • % Tenants signing in advance: 50 – 60% in China
  • # Surface area under construction
  • # Average number of staff per office building
  • # Number of construction project (McDonald, 2010)

Reference

McDonald (2010), China’s skyscraper boom buoys global industry, available at http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_china_skyscraper_empire (accessed 6 December 2010).
CRU, WSD and Macquarie Rearch (2010), China Builds, World Watches, available through http://www.advisoranalyst.com/glablog/2010/03/15/china-construction-boom-or-bust/ (assessed 6 December 2010).
Fernando (2010), China’s Construction Boom Pushes Power Consumption Up 25%, available at http://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-power-consumption-2010-4 (accessed 6 December 2010).
Trendir (2008), Modern China Architecture – Shanghai Tower Twists its Way to the Top, available at http://www.trendir.com/ultra-modern/modern-china-architecture-shanghai-tower-twists-its-way-to-the-top.html (assessed 6 December 2010).

Data visualization of the Ireland debt crisis

Thursday, November 25th, 2010

Facilitated by improved data access and visualization software, infographics are today the pinnacle of the saying ‘a picture speaks a thousand words‘.

The image below is a representation of the web of debt between several key European economies, having at the center a group of countries currently called PIIGS: Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain.

PIIGS

Source: The New York Times, 2010

References:

New York Times (2010), Europe’s Web of Debt, available at: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/05/02/weekinreview/02marsh.html, accessed 24/22/2010

Mission statements as strategic management tools – A brief history

Saturday, June 26th, 2010

smartKPIs.com Performance Architect update 25/2010

The pursuit of organizational clarity and alignment towards a strategic direction has preoccupied researchers and practitioners for many decades. Especially over the last 50 years, a variety of management concepts have been popularized and adopted by organizations with more or less success.

Two such management concepts that gained popularity since then are mission and vision statements. They are considered strategic management tools or instruments, one of the clearest definitions for both being: “The mission statement is a statement of a company’s purpose,…, if mission outlines what the company is attempting to achieve at the present time, its vision offers a view of what the enterprise might become.” (Grant 2002: 60).

The term “mission” is reported to have been used first by Jesuit monks, to depict the act of sending monks on overseas missions, such as the missions in the 16th century in South America, following the landing of Christopher Columbus (Merino and Newson 1995). Over time, the use of the term expanded from religion to the military, who used it to reflect a specific assignment allocated as part of a plan or strategy. The link between military and business vocabulary was facilitated by books such as “On War” by Carl von Clausewitz (1832), considered one of the most important treaties on the philosophy of war. An entire section of the book (“Of strategy in general”) was dedicated to strategy and is considered today an important precursor of strategy management literature.

One of the earliest uses of a mission statement outside of religious and military organizations is reported to have occurred in 1941, when the American Journal of Economics and Sociology was established by Adolph Lowe and Franz Oppenheimer. As founding members of the editorial board they adopted a mission statement for the journal that called for cooperation and constructive synthesis in social sciences (Forstater 2002).

In business context, the use of the term mission had a different path. As early as 1960, Stoller and Van Horn wrote about how the military approach to planning can be applied in a business context. Smalter (1964) published one of the first articles exploring the influence of military literature on management practice. It explored in detail how the military concept of missions can be applied in business, however the term was used more in a “program-package” sense and not in the sense it is widely used today. Tombach (1961:54) had a different approach to using the word “mission” to cross-over from military to business literature: “the mission of defense […] can be broadly defined as that of preventing or minimizing damage to a target or target complex […] from hostile action.”

According to David (1989), the link to the business environment was facilitated by Peter Drucker, who started to write on the topic in mid 1970s. One of Drucker’s recommended questions for any organization was: “What is our business?”. David (1989:90) considered the answer is reflected in Drucker’s own words (1973): “A business is not defined by its name, statutes, or articles of incorporation. It is defined by the business mission. Only a clear definition of the mission and purpose of the organization makes possible clear and realistic business objectives.”

McGinnis (1981), Pearce II (1982), Staples and Black (1984) were among the first to dedicate entire articles to the discussion of the use of missions statements as strategic management tools. The term “mission statement” was understood as expressing the fundamental purpose specific to an organisation.

By 1986, two things occurred. On one hand, mission statements became widely used in corporate environments. Want (1986:48) notes that: “Executives and consultants alike are familiar with mission statements, and many have participated in the mission-writing exercise.” On the other hand, divergent views how mission statements should be formulated and used started to emerge. Pearce II and David (1987) proposed eight key components, among which mentions of target customers and markets, identification of products and services, geographic domain, core technologies and desired public image. Want (1986) lists as primary components of corporate mission statements: purpose, principle business aims, corporate identity, policies of the company and the values.

Regardless of these challenges, by 1990s research on the use of mission statements started to focus on their use (Ireland and Hitt 1992), their role (Leuthesser and Kohli 1997) and impact on firm performance (Bart and Baetz 1998). From 2000 onwards, researchers focused increasingly on questioning the value added by mission statements. Titles such as “Mission Statements: Are They Smoke and Mirrors?” (Bartkus, Glassman and McAfee 2000) and “Mission Possible: Do School Mission Statements Work?” (Davis, Ruhe, Lee, Rajadhyaksha 2007) are illustrative. Further research in the impact of mission statements on the financial performance concluded that they have little or no impact on financial performance (Bartkus, Glassman and McAfee 2006).

One of the most comprehensive reviews of the topic by Stallworth Williams (2008) concluded that despite the challenges in the formulation and use of mission statements, they shouldn’t be considered fads, as they withstood the test of time and continue to matter.

Mission statements continue to remain an important strategic management and business performance management tool, helping with grounding organisations by clarifying their purpose or reason to exist and framing the context of their operations.

Stay smart! Enjoy smartKPIs.com!

Aurel Brudan

Performance Architect,
www.smartKPIs.com


References

Bart C, Baetz M (1998) The relationship between mission statements and firm performance: An exploratory study, Journal of Management Studies, 35(6): 823-853.

Bartkus B, Glassman M and McAfee B (2000), Mission Statements: Are They Smoke and Mirrors? Business Horizons, November-December: 23-28.

Bartkus B, Glassman M and McAfee B (2006), Mission Statement Quality and Financial Performance, European Management Journal, 24(1): 86–94.

David F. (1989) How Companies Define Their Mission, Long Range Planning, 22(1): 90-97.

Davis JH, Ruhe JA, Lee M, Rajadhyaksha U (2007), Mission Possible: Do School Mission Statements Work?, Journal of Business Ethics, 70:99–110.

Forstater M (2002) How the AJES Got its Mission Statement in 1941, American Journal of Economics and Sociology, 61(4):779-786.

Grant RM (2002) Contemporary Strategy Analysis, 4th edition, Blackwell Publishers, Oxford, UK.

Ireland RD and Hitt MA (1992) Mission Statements: Importance, Challenge, and Recommendations for Development, Business Horizons, May-June: 34-42.

Leuthesser L and Kohli C (1997) Corporate Identity: The Role Of Mission Statements, Business Horizons, May-June: 34-42.

McGinnis VJ (1981), The mission statement: A key step in strategic planning, Business, November December: 39-43.

Merino O, Newson LA (1995) ‘Jesuit Missions in Spanish America: The Aftermath of the Expulsion’. Paper presented at the Conference of Latin Americanist Geographers, accessed at http://sites.maxwell.syr.edu/CLAG/yearbook1995/newson.pdf on 29 June 2010.

Pearce II JA (1982), The Company Mission as a Strategic Goal, Sloan Management Review, Spring: 15-24.

Pearce II JA, David F (1987) Corporate Mission Statements: The Bottom Line, The Academy of Management Executive, 1(2):109- 115.

Smalter DJ (1964) The Influence of Department of Defense Practices on Corporate Planning, Management Technology, 4(2):115-138.

Stallworth Williams L (2008), The Mission Statement – A Corporate Reporting Tool With a Past, Present, Future, Journal of Business Communication, 45( 2): 94-119.

Staples WA, Black KU (1984) Defining Your Business Mission: A Strategic Perspective, Journal of Business Strategies, 1:33-39.

Stoller DS, Van Horn RL (1960) Design of a Management Information System, Management Technology, 1(1):86-91.

Tombach H (1961) Critique of Air Defense Measures of Effectiveness, Management Technology, 1(3):52-62.

Von Clausenwitz C (1832) On War, 1st edition in English (1874) translated by Colonel J.J. Graham, accessed at http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1946 on 28 June 2010.

Want JH (1986) Corporate mission, Management Review, August: 46–50.

Walker, Rob 1992, Rank Xerox – Management Revolution”, Long Range Planning, Vol. 25, No. 1, pp. 9 to 21

Relationship Marketing Performance Management

Saturday, May 8th, 2010

Although not benefiting from a unanimously accepted definition, Relationship Marketing is a sub-discipline of Marketing defined (Gummesson 2004, p. 136) as ”Marketing based on interaction within networks of relationships”. The classic Relationship Marketing refers to the physical distribution network relationships, with main focus on supplier-customer interactions (Gummesson 1997 cited in Harwood & Garry 2006), the premise being the mutual benefit for both parties and also the commitment to ensure relationship longevity (Harwood and Gary, 2006). While the supplier-customer is not the only form of Relationship Marketing existence, it is argued (Ballantine et al. 2000 cited in Harwood & Garry, 2006) that customer relationship marketing is the most representative for achieving improved market and financial performance.

Because developing long-term relationships with customers is not the best approach in all situations, special attention should be given to assessing customer relationships in terms of profitability, satisfaction etc. and this can be done by the means of a performance management process. The premises are that not all customers are willing to engage in relationship with their suppliers, nor do they all add value that makes them all attractive for the organization to invest in. Hence, organizations should invest resources in those relationships that are profitable for them and which they can nurture in the best way possible so as to have satisfied and content customers.

Although the question of accurately assessing the Return on Relationship Investment (ROR) remains unclear (Gummesson 2004 cited in Bonnemaizon et al. 2007), the technological developments, mainly in the shape of CRM (customer relationship management) and other IT tools and databases give an outstanding value and facilitation to the efforts of measuring and managing relationships. It is argued that these tools strive to employ tangible metrics to evaluate intangible dimensions that occur in the context of Relationship Marketing, such as trust and cooperation (Lages et al. 2008).

It is argued that the use of relationship performance metrics serves various purposes, among which: helping organizations to administer resources more efficiently by allocating them differently to different kinds of customers and identifying deviations from objectives, establishing priorities in terms of marketing efforts and even supporting motivational and rewards policies by relying on comprehensive data (Lages et al. 2008). Performance Management can support the constant monitoring and improvement of customer relationship processes.

Nigel Piercy (1998) describes the systems employed to monitor outcome performance of Relationship Marketing as part of the implementation stage of the Relationship Marketing strategy. He suggests an extended approach to measuring not only the outcomes, but investigating also the drivers of these outcomes, which rely on the behavior of the people within the organization that impacts on what the customer receives in terms of service and quality. The author suggests a three stage customer satisfaction measurement process that covers the interaction between the customer and the internal environment:

  • The first stage describes the managerial use of customer satisfaction measurement in areas such as quality and operations management, staff training and evaluation and strategic management control;
  • This further on helps diminishing the internal processes barriers to Relationship Marketing (perceived market drivers, logistics, corporate culture etc.);
  • Which in turn enhance the third stage, the marketing strategies (service and quality, competitive differentiation etc.).

This describes a strategic and decisional three-stage process that relies on the measurement, but with a fourth element – the measurement that closes a strategic cycle of measure – use – improve.

References

Bonnemaizon et al. 2007, ‘Relationship Marketing in 2015: A Delphi Approach,’ European Management Journal, vol. 25, no. 1, pp. 50-59.

Gummesson, E 2004, ‘Return on relationships (ROR): the value of relationship marketing and CRM in business-to-business contexts,’ Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, vol. 19, no. 2, pp. 136-148.

Harwood, TG & Garry, T 2006, ‘Relationship marketing: why bother?,’ Handbook of Business Strategy, pp. 107-11.

Lages et al. 2008, ‘The B2B-RELPERF scale and scorecard: Bringing relationship marketing theory into business-to-business practice,’ Industrial Marketing Management, vol. 37, pp. 696-697.

Piercy, NF 1998, ‘Barriers to implementing relationship marketing: analyzing the internal market-place,’ Journal of Strategic Marketing, vol. 6, pp. 209-22.

Performance Management / Measurement Jobs: Corporate Performance Management Principal Consultants required

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

The job following job ad was advertised on 14 April 2010 by Informatiq Consulting Ltd., a UK based recruiting agency:

Applications can be submitted online following this link.

Job title: Corporate Performance Management Principal Consultants
Job ref: MH41807
Job description: Leading Performance Improvement practice urgently seeks Corporate Performance Management (CPM) specialists to further develop their prestigious Big 4 Consulting offering.

This is an unprecedented opportunity to join a fast moving, dynamic and growing professional services consultancy. As a talented Financial BI Consultant you will be educated to degree level (ideally with additional ACA / CIMA / ACCA / MBA qualifications) and have a proven track record of defining, designing and delivering CPM, Shared Services/BPO or Corporate Treasury solutions.

Comfortable advising key stakeholders to CXO level you will have detailed experience leading projects in one or more of the following areas: Budgeting and Forecasting, Consolidation, Management Reporting or KPI/Balanced Scorecard.

Critically you will offer expert knowledge current CPM tool sets be that: Oracle Hyperion Financial Management (HFM, Hyperion Planning, Essbase, Hyperion System 9), Oracle OBIEE or SAP BPC (Outlooksoft). In summary, you will require full-life-cycle CPM experience from initial business development and pre-bid advice through to implementation and delivery.

This exciting opportunity provides the perfect platform to develop a management consulting career across performance management strategy, process improvement or CPM implementation.

Therefore if you have the skills and ability to make a difference why wait, apply by sending your CV to malcolm_h@informatiq.co.uk today!

Location: London or Birmingham base
Region: London
Country: United Kingdom
Type: Permanent
Hours: Full-Time
Salary: £60-85,000 + bens + bonus
Application deadline: ASAP
Start date: TBD
Company name: Informatiq Consulting Ltd.
Contact name: Malcolm House
Phone: 01923 224481
Fax: 01923 224493
Visit the website: http://www.informatiq.co.uk
http://www.informatiq.co.uk/

Performance Management / Measurement Jobs: Corporate Scorecard Manager

Monday, April 12th, 2010

The job following job advertisement was advertised on 8 April 2010 by Pertemps Ltd, a UK based recruiting agency.

Applications can be submitted online following this link.

Job title: Corporate Scorecard Manager
Job ref: 257739
Job description: A global organisation based in the heart of the West end is seeking a competent individual to join them.

• To be the global manager of the client’s Corporate Scorecard for Performance Measurement; • To ensure the scorecard process runs efficiently and effectively; to act as the global source of expertise on the scorecard and the data produced within the scorecard process; • To undertake analysis of the scorecard data in combination with data from other relevant sources to provide information and recommendations to guide management decision-making

This role will manage the presentation of numeric & non-numeric performance data for presentation to 11 regional managers. This data is to be used to inform their planning decisions. The client is in the not for profit sector, so their metrics are non-financial.

The role will involve using IT systems which are currently in development, and will need taking forward.

Balanced Scorecard experience would be beneficial, but it is the ability to engage with & present data appropriately that is essential.

A good relationship builder, self starter with strong IT database experience would be ideal. SAP is desirable.

This role is for 3 months, and will pay £120-£150 per day.

Location: London
Region: London
Country: United Kingdom
Type: Temporary
Hours: Full-Time
Salary: 120.00 to 150.00 per day (Pound Sterling)
Application deadline: 07/Jul/2010
Start date: ASAP
Company name: Pertemps
Contact name: Linda Moran
Phone: 0207 6211304
Fax: 0207 6266671
Visit the website: http://www.pertemps.co.uk

Sport Management and the Winter Olympic Games: Vancouver 2010

Friday, February 26th, 2010

What can we associate Olympic Games with, and what is the importance and place of the Olympic Games among other sport competitions?

If asked these questions to the large public some would say that Olympic Games is the oldest and most important sport competition taking place every four year. Others would say that is a celebration of sport, joy and peace between nations. While some would acknowledge the huge economical benefits and recognition, such a competition can bring for the organizing nation of the Games.

Without no doubt all of these remarks are right. But what can we add more is that Olympic Games above all  is a celebration of olympism and performance.

Starting from this last remark let’s have a look at the most important drivers of a successful Olympic Games edition and how can be performance in regards with such an event be best pictured?

Just a few days ago a new edition of the Winter Olympic Games, has witnessed its 21st opening with a grandiose ceremony in Vancouver, Canada. It was for the first time in the history of Olympic Games when an opening ceremony was held in an enclosed stadium. And it was for the first time in the history of Winter Olympic Games when more than 60.000 thousand spectators were present in the stadium premises for the opening ceremony and other 3 billion watched it from behind the TV screens.

If looking only at these figures and we couple them with athletes performance during olympic competitions we could say that the Winter Olympic Games, Vancouver 2010 should be considered a big success. But is that right?

Beyond the unprecedentedly media coverage of the event, beyond the athletes’ performance there are a lot of other factors that play an important role in the success of an Olympic Game edition. All of them are enabled by Sport Management as a business discipline. When applied well, it secures the success of a competition from both a sportive and administrative point of view. Listed below are some performance measures and their related figures which portrait Vancouver Winter Olympic Games 2010 edition from a performance management perspective:

# Viewers per televised sport event: 34,5 million Americans viewed the opening ceremony in prime time, 2 out of 3 Canadians watched the event and overall it was projected that more than 3 billion people witnessed the opening event from behind the TV screens around the world.

# Event tickets available: 1, 6 million tickets

# Volunteers supporting the sport: 25,000 volunteers are supporting the Vancouver 2010 Olympic event (approximated figure)

# Athletes and officials attending competition: More than 5,500 Olympic athletes and officials (approximated figure)

# Countries participating in the sport event:  82 countries have qualified athletes and are attending the event.

# Accredited media representatives:  10,000 media representatives have been accredited for different events during the Olympic Games (approximated figure)

# Medal events during the competition: 86 medal awarding events held during the 16th days of competition.

$ Sport event operating cost: $ 1, 76 billion estimated costs

$ Sport event security costs:  $ 900 million estimated costs

$ Athletes accomodation facilities development cost:  $ 167 million estimated cost of the Vancouver Olympic Village

$ Venues renovation costs:  $ 365 million estimated renovation cost of the Olympic venue

# Distance travelled by the Olympic torch:  45,000 kilometers across Canada

# Olympic torch bearers: 12,000 Canadians were given the occasion to bear the Olympic torch

# Olympic torch  relay duration:  106 days.

As we can acknowledge from the figures listed above the organization of an Olympic Games edition implies a great effort and resource allocation. However its success can be determined with precision only at its end, and what we have presented above is just a fraction of the performance indicators that can portrait a sport event. For more performance measures from sport management industry visit the smartkpis.com database.

Additional resources:

References:

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