|
| WebNote |
|
|
Click Here to go...
BACK |
Responsive Operations Strategy |
|
| |
Gingrich and Metz describe how the breakfast cereal maker Kellogg™, has implemented an operations strategy of responsiveness and flexibility, and as a result, has enjoyed tremendous growth in market share. By offering an ever growing variety of products, and selling them through multiple distribution channels to carefully fragmented market segments, Kellogg has left its competitors behind in a dust cloud of complexity. Kellogg's ability to handle complexity has become a major source of competitive advantage.
|
|
| |
The authors insist that the key to corporate agility lies in a new management style. They have identified four imperatives in this new management style. 1) A bottom-up organizational structure that eliminates functionalization and compartmentalism. 2) An emphasis on focus instead of scale. 3) Anticipation of uncertainty and change, with the adoption of decentralized decision making capabilities. 4) The constant overhaul of the organization and its culture. The authors are careful to point out that none of these four imperatives is a cure-all, and that to be effective, all four must be combined with intelligent expectations of, and support for the company's value-adding employees.
|
|
| |
|
| |
Gingrich, James A., Metz, Horst J. "Conquering the Costs of Complexity" in Business Horizons: The Indiana Business Review. Indiana University Graduate School. Bloomington: IN. May-June 1990.
|
|
|
