CEO Career Breadth Creates Novel Strategies

Companies thrive or die off their ability to find the right type of leadership to manage their daily operations. Investors would be wise to consider the background and depth of experience when hiring their next CEO. A study of CEOs at 250 Fortune companies found that CEO career variety is positively associated with firm-level novelty that offers strategic dynamism and strategic distinctiveness that can help firms change and grow (Crossland, et. al. 2014). 

Strategic novelty is the ability of CEOs to think out of the box and beyond the medium of traditional strategies of those firms within their field. Instead of using only the same strategies, as other firms, they often seek out alternative strategies that could potentially have more lucrative outcomes. Novelty can make the difference between a market leader and market follower.

Career breadth is the multiple industries and places that people have worked over their careers. A CEO who worked in a single industry throughout their career will naturally be indoctrinated into those beliefs and have difficulty thinking about new ways of doing things. A person with wider experience has the ability to think creatively that leads to different results. 

Such CEOs are more likely to seek out experimentation and change as a method of managing the business. As problems arise they aren’t stuck with the status quo and often try and find new ways of doing things. This can help organizations find a way to transform themselves when market difficulties arise. 

The advantages of hiring the right CEO can make a huge difference in the growth potential of a business. Businesses naturally face internal and external challenges that can hamper their growth. CEOs that have a wider breadth of knowledge can put their mind to work on solving these challenges in new ways and hence lead their company to a new level of performance. 

Crossland, C., et. al. (2014). CEO career variety: effects on firm-level strategic and social novelty. Academy of Management Journal, 57 (3).

Researching Operational Problems for Efficiency Improvement

Organizational growth comes through the efforts of individuals who understand, explore and propose new ways of improving business. Those who improve upon processes, no matter how slight, must be able to recognize those problems and then find ways of improving operations to reduce their impact. Organizations that encourage operational research often find themselves developing at higher rates when compared to many of their competitors. The process of investigating problems, finding solutions, and implementing those solutions must continue if a firm will survive new market threats.

New firms are often more in alignment with market needs.  These hot firms grow quickly and become market leaders themselves knocking the previous generation of firms from the top spots.  The destructive development of new products requires finding new ways of meeting goals. Existing firms must continually reinvest in their operations by conducting research and implement their findings.

Operational improvements can happen anywhere and regularly lead to improvements in firm profitability. For example, audit based research into policy deployment, standardized work, housekeeping, changeovers, maintenance, cultural awareness, and materials at a lean manufacturing company led to significant improvements in firm performance (Taggart & Kienhofer, 2013).  The process of measuring and improving operational performance was beneficial for the organization beyond the research investment costs.

The key point is that it isn't just the core functions that have room for improvement as the entire organization is also open to innovative development. Core operations may have some of the highest ROI results but still develop with the help of many support functions. We can see this connection when improvements in the speed of inventory storage and recall leads to more responsive manufacturing lines. 

To find a solution requires digging into problems with sufficient depth in order to understand what factors are impacting operational output. There will be opinions upon opinions but most of these are useless unless they are supported by some type of evidence. It is important to understand these opinions are still a starting place for exploratory research and problem formation because collectively they can offer important insights into the internal mechanics of an organization.

Operational research follows many of the same rules as scientific research. Even though there is not the same level of rigorous scrutiny a poor research methodology still leads to a poor result. When making suggestions that can impact millions of dollars it is important to ensure that investigations and findings are relevant, reliable, and valid.

A simple model of how to conduct investigative research:

Formulate the Problem: Understand what you are trying to research and formulate a simple statement of the problem. For example, you may develop a statement such as "Reduce waste costs by 25%".

Research the Problem: Researching a problem requires talking to people close to the source, finding places to test, and running statistical analysis.

Construct a Model: Use the data and information you have collected to develop a model determining the cause and effect of problems.

Propose a Solution: Propose a solution based upon the model. A proper and concise definition of the solution is an absolute necessity.

Implement the Solution: Implement the solution. Sometimes it is necessary to implement change in stages checking to make sure each step can be reversed.

Create Feedback Loop: The only real way to know if implementation has been successful is to remeasure to ensure improvement is sustained.

Taggart, P. & Kienhofer, F. (2013). The effectiveness of lean manufacturing audits in measuring operational performance improvements. South African Journal of Industrial Engineering, 24 (2).

 

Call for Papers: 28th International Business Research Conference

Submission Deadline: July 21, 2014
Date: September, 8^th & 9^th 2014
Venue: Novotel Barcelona City Hotel, Barcelona, Spain

Website: www.info-researchmeeting.com 

We seek either abstract and/or full paper from the academics, scholars or researchers in the broad fields of Accounting, Banking, Economics, Finance, Investment, Management, Marketing and all other business subjects for the above international conference organised by London Academic Research and Publication, UK, Australian Centre for Accounting, Finance and Economics, Australia and American Research and Publication, USA and sponsored by eight international peer reviewed journals, which are indexed by Cabell Publication, Ulrich and EBSCO of USA, ABDC and ERA of Australia. Criteria used to select papers for the conference include originality of the paper which must not be submitted in any journal

Paper Submission: Please send your paper to Ms. Nuha Jahan via spainconfo@gmail.com

 Website:  www.info-researchmeeting.com

Call for Papers: 2015 Isis-Miami Beach International Multidisciplinary Academic Conference

Dates: January 4th - 6th, 2015

Theme: Promoting Global Progress and Excellence in Academia

Place: Miami Beach

Journals Sponsoring 2015 ISIS/IAABR New Year's International Multidisciplinary Academic Conference in Miami Beach:

- Journal of Strategic and International Studies
- Review of Strategic and International Studies
- Journal of Academy for Advancement of Business Research
- Review of Business and Economic Studies
- Review of Social Studies, Law, and Psychology

Papers related to all areas of Accounting, Banking, Business Ethics, Communication and Media, e-Business, e-Government, e-Learning, Ecology, Economics, Engineering, Environment and Life Sciences, Finance, Gender Studies, Globalization, Human Resources, IT, Law and Legal Studies, Leadership, Logistics, Management, Marketing, Political Science, Psychology, Security Studies, Social Sciences, Social Work, Sustainable Development, and Women Studies are invited for the above international conference, which is expected to be attended by authors from nearly all parts of the World. People without papers can also participate in this conference, and they are invited to serve as session chairs or discussants, as well as informal contributors to the academic quality of this international event.

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