Acerca da atenção organizacional

"We have found that firms are surprised by significant events from outside of the firm at twice the rate of surprises from inside, such as fraud, discrimination, bribery or reckless behaviour. Large firms with a global reach report they are surprised by outside events more than twice per year. These are only measures of the frequency of surprises — not the magnitude of the impact of the surprise.
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Deconstructing the frequency and type of past surprises is a good place to start a productive conversation about the allocation of a team’s collective attention to each of the four cells of the Myopia Matrix
...

Each cell in the matrix is prone to attentional misfires that might have been avoided if closer attention had been paid. The key is to examine a representative sample of cases and treat each as an informative historical ‘stress test’. The challenge is to look inside those cases that will best surface deeper systemic weakness.
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TUNNEL VISION is a common consequence of a narrow definition of the market served and an overemphasis on current operations.
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WILLFUL BLINDNESS happens when we become aware of something that we would rather not know and therefore ignore or unconsciously suppress.
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MISSED CHANCES can occur when the organization’s internal attention is focused narrowly without sufficient slack to explore opportunities at the periphery."

Trechos retirados de "Managing Your Most Precious Resource: Organizational Attention" de Paul J.H. Schoemaker e George S. Day.

A selectividade da atenção (parte III)

Parte I e parte II.

"the world, as perceived, is maya— appearance or illusion. This means, in part, that people are blinded by their desires (as well as merely incapable of seeing things as they truly are). This is true, in a sense that transcends the metaphorical. Your eyes are tools. They are there to help you get what you want. The price you pay for that utility, that specific, focused direction, is blindness to everything else.
...
But all that ignored world presents a truly terrible problem when we’re in crisis, and nothing whatsoever is turning out the way we want it to. ... Happily, however, that problem contains within it the seeds of its own solution. Since you’ve ignored so much, there is plenty of possibility left where you have not yet looked."

Trechos retirados de "12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos" de Jordan Peterson

A selectividade da atenção (parte II)

Há dias, na parte I, relacionei o gorila com a estratégia e com o que se mede num BSC, certamente influenciado por "you only see what you aim at".

Entretanto, ontem ao ler "12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos" de Jordan Peterson, encontro o original:

"What you aim at determines what you see.
...
we triage, when we see. Most of our vision is peripheral, and low resolution. We save the fovea for things of importance. We point our high-resolution capacities at the few specific things we are aiming at. And we let everything else— which is almost everything— fade, unnoticed, into the background.
...
That’s how you deal with the overwhelming complexity of the world: you ignore it, while you concentrate minutely on your private concerns. You see things that facilitate your movement forward, toward your desired goals. You detect obstacles, when they pop up in your path. You’re blind to everything else (and there’s a lot of everything else— so you’re very blind."

Drama e atenção

"The brilliant thing Pilpel has done here is to understand the power of a little drama: to take a banal and clichéd loyalty mechanism and turn it into something I not only find appealing, but am actually sitting here and writing about for several thousand complete strangers. We live in a world of continuous partial attention. What were we all doing in the line while we were waiting for our turn at the counter? Looking at our phones. How much collateral did we look at while we were waiting? Zero. If they wanted us to notice anything about them, they needed to be a little dramatic.
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We think of drama as a creative act, and historically perhaps it has been. But in the attention economy, a world of three screens and continuous partial attention, using drama well has now become a key strategic discipline: an experiential moment that makes us engage, even if we’re not looking, and focus on a key attribute that the brand wants us to notice about them.
...
It pays to be dramatic, it seems.
.
Strategically dramatic, of course."

Para considerar...

Trechos retirados de "A splash of drama"

A selectividade da atenção

No âmbito de um projecto BSC comentava com alguém que era um bom passo o CEO da empresa deixar as instalações da fábrica e ir com a equipa Comercial e Marketing para outras instalações. Como o CEO é alguém da "ferrugem" no sentido em que criou a fábrica de raiz, trabalhou como engenheiro, conhece-a ao pormenor, facilmente vê a sua atenção capturada pelo dia-a-dia da fábrica quando a estratégia, não baseada no preço e assente em marcas, requer outro tipo de temas para ocupar a estreita largura de banda que nós humanos temos.

Depois de enviar um e-mail com esta opinião apareceu na minha mente este filme:


Quando nos concentramos numas coisas, as outras ficam invisíveis. Recordar "A importância do essencial"

"you only see what you aim at"

"So if we are all monsters, how are we to be saved? The first thing is to understand how our worldview evolves. Crucial to this is a 20-year-old experiment on inattention – the famous Invisible Gorilla experiment. This involved recording two teams of basketball players and playing back the game to observers, who were asked to count the number of passes their team made. During the game, a man in a gorilla suit walks on to the court, pounds his chest and then walks off. More than 50% of the observers, astonishingly, did not notice the gorilla at all.
.
Why is this so important? Because, as Peterson notes, you only see what you aim at – not only metaphorically but also literally and physiologically. Your perception is adjusted to your aims. So if your aims are dark and corrupted, you will see the dark and corrupt things that facilitate your aims. And if your aims are high, you will see different things. Belief colours perception. This fits in with his claim that you must pursue proper meaning rather than happiness."

Recordar o que aqui escrevemos ao longo dos anos acerca do retorno da atenção. Tornamos-nos naquilo que pensamos. Se pensarmos baixo seremos baixos.

Trecho retirado de "Jordan Peterson: ‘The pursuit of happiness is a pointless goal’"

Atenção selectiva

Há tempos Tony Ulwick escreveu:

"A market, which is the target of everything a company does, should not be defined around something so unstable that it is only valid until the next product iteration. It should be defined around something that is stable for decades, making long-term strategic investments more attractive and providing the company with a vision for the future."

Mais recentemente voltou ao tema:

"A functional job-to-be-done is often a job that customers have been trying to accomplish for years, decades and in some cases even centuries. ... A functional job is stable over time. What changes over time are the products and services that companies offer to help get the job done better.
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Because the job-to-be-done is stable over time, it is an attractive focal point around which to create customer value.
...
Making the job-to-be-done the unit of analysis means it is the job — not the product, the customer or customer demographics — that is to be studied, dissected and understood. This means that companies should not define customer needs around the product, but should instead define customer needs around getting the job done."

Ao ler "ARE EXOSKELETONS THE FUTURE OF PHYSICAL LABOR?" e "Thought-Controlled Prosthetic Hand Restores 100 Realistic Touch Sensations" penso logo em:

• Cuidado com a absolutização do que a nossa empresa produz
• Um exemplo de miopia na vida real

E penso nos Florêncios e as Antrais que vão estar tão concentrados no passado, a comprar conconcorrentes, a optimizar o poder iluminante das velas, que não vão perceber o quanto o seu mundo está a mudar. O job-to-be-done continua lá bem vivo, agora a ferramenta para o realizar vai ser modificada, trocada...

Um festival de blasfémias!!!

Em "Talvez o tema que mais nos separa dos níveis de produtividade do resto da Europa Ocidental" incluí esta figura:

Curioso, fui à procura do último livro do John Mullins referido na entrevista.
Encontrei "The Customer-Funded Business: Start, Finance, or Grow Your Company with Your Customers’ Cash". Um festival de blasfémias, tal o distanciamento face à cultura mainstream acerca das startups e do empreendedorismo, transformada num concurso de beleza para cativar investidores e financiadores em detrimento da cativação de clientes.

Esta manhã, entre as 7h30 e as 8h30 tive a oportunidade de ler o primeiro e o oitavo capítulos:

"I believe raising equity at the outset of a new venture’s journey is, at least most of the time, an exceedingly bad idea—for both entrepreneurs and investors alike.
...
[Moi ici: Segue-se um argumento que há anos uso no Twitter, sobre o tema] waiting to raise capital forces the entrepreneur’s atten- tion toward his or her customers, where it should be in the first place.
...
making do with the probably modest amounts of cash your customers will give you enforces frugality, rather than waste. Having too much money can make you stupid and lets you ignore your customer! Having less money will make you smarter, and will force you to run your business better, too.
...
focusing your efforts to raise cash from customers who are willing and eager to buy from your yet-unproven com- pany is likely to mercifully put to rest a half-baked or not- quite-right idea that requires more development—a pivot, in today’s entrepreneurial lexicon—in order to hit the mark.
...
“We think that you shouldn’t start with the assumption that you need to raise money . . . Huge companies have been created with little or no outside investment.”
...

• Raising capital demands a lot of time and energy, distracting entrepreneurs from building the actual business.

• Raising capital too early means pitching the merit of the business idea to potential investors, rather than proving its merit among customers in the marketplace."

Não consigo deixar de pensar que o entrevistado, ao recomendar o livro de Mullins o fez com um sorriso maroto.

Apostar nas forças

Excelente reflexão, útil para empresas que sentem que têm de mudar de vida:

"In their efforts to compete, business strategists often forget a basic principle: Build from your strengths. [Moi ici: Começar pela análise do ADN] The most successful companies have a clear, well-articulated view of what's important to them and their customers. They understand that the way to win consistently is through what they do rather than what they sell.
.
These companies also understand that “what they do” is unique to them; they have their own capabilities and practices that no other company could quite duplicate, even if it tried. In that sense, building from your strengths is the most reliable way we have found to differentiate your company.
...
when you understand what you’re great at, and design your capabilities and strategy accordingly, you can define how you want to compete, and shape your own future rather than waiting for others to do it for you.
...
1. Accept Your Weaknesses
...
All of us — individuals, teams, and organizations — have weaknesses. These are not skill gaps; those can be corrected with learning. Weaknesses are inherent deficiencies of talent or capability that do not change even after aggressive efforts to improve them. Pride and our ingrained work ethic may cause us to deny our weaknesses, but acceptance is the first step toward designing for strength.
...
2. Recognize Your Specific Strengths
.
Weaknesses tend to be universal and broad. ... But strengths are often extraordinarily specific.
...
3. Solve the Right Problem
A moment of magic accompanies the willingness to quit. It involves gaining a better perspective. Prior to this moment, it is almost impossible to be objective about your challenges. Too many emotions and pressures intrude. But now, you can evaluate your options more dispassionately, and — in the language of design thinking — learn to ask better questions. The problem you are trying to solve may not be the right one to address.
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In my case, fixing my weaknesses was the wrong problem to solve. I have since come to think that the same is true for many other people and organizations seeking breakthrough performance. Instead of solving for “how do I fix my weaknesses?”  [Moi ici: Isto é o que critico quando escrevo aqui sobre o Return-of-Attention das organizações patronais. Gastam demasiado tempo a combater a última guerra quando o mundo entretanto mudou, em vez de procurar uma nova guerra onde tenham vantagens únicas] I asked myself, “how can I design for my unique strengths?”

...
4. Double Down on Your Strengths"

Trechos retirados de "Design for Your Strengths"

O truque da atenção

"Pre-suasion" é uma leitura viciante:

"The Importance of Attention . . . Is Importance...
WHAT’S SALIENT IS IMPORTANT
...
anything that draws focused attention to itself can lead observers to overestimate its importance.
...
“Nothing in life is as important as you think it is while you are thinking about it.”
...
a communicator who gets an audience to focus on a key element of a message pre-loads it with importance. [Moi ici: Quase que jurava que as redes sociais minam esta possibilidade daí que os agenda-setters não gostem] This form of pre-suasion accounts for what many see as the principle role (labeled agenda setting) that the news media play in influencing public opinion. The central tenet of agenda-setting theory is that the media rarely produce change directly, by presenting compelling evidence that  sweeps an audience to new positions; they are much more likely to persuade indirectly, by giving selected issues and facts better coverage than other issues and facts. [Moi ici: Lembrei-me do nome Alberto Gonçalves. Por que será?] It’s this coverage that leads audience members—by virtue of the greater attention they devote to certain topics—to decide that these are the most important to be taken into consideration when adopting a position.
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This sensible system of focusing our limited attentional resources on what does indeed possess special import has an imperfection, though: we can be brought to the mistaken belief that something is important merely because we have been led by some irrelevant factor to give it our narrowed attention. All too often, people believe that if they have paid attention to an idea or event or group, it must be important enough to warrant the consideration.
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Thus, the persuader who artfully draws outsize attention to the most favorable feature of an offer becomes a successful pre-suader."

Em linha com o aviso que faço aos líderes das PME quando acreditam que o que os media relatam acerca das empresas grandes é aplicável e desejável nas suas empresas.

A importância do essencial

Ao longo dos anos abordo o tema do retorno da atenção e da estreiteza da nossa largura de banda, se dedicamos a nossa atenção a umas coisas não a podemos dedicar a outras ao mesmo tempo. Recordar O retorno da atenção (Agosto de 2009).

Agora em Pre-suasion encontro:

"In the English language, we are said to “pay” attention, which plainly implies that the process extracts a cost. Research on cognitive functioning shows us the form of the fee: when attention is paid to something, the price is attention lost to something else. Indeed, because the human mind appears able to hold only one thing in conscious awareness at a time, the toll is a momentary loss of focused attention to everything else. Have you ever noticed how difficult it is to experience - genuinely experience - two things at once?
...
my car’s CD player is structured to work like my brain, allowing me but a single track of music at a time. That’s for good reason, as it would be folly to play more than one simultaneously. I’d just hear noise. So it is with human cognition. Even though there are always multiple “tracks” of information available, we consciously select only the one we want to register at that moment. Any other arrangement would leave us overloaded and unable to react to distinct aspects of  the mongrelized input."

Recordar a contagem de passes e o gorila.

Por isto, também por isto, é importante esclarecer o que não é prioritário, o que não é estratégico, para que possamos dedicar mais tempo ao essencial.

Contra o mainstream (parte I)

Encontrei há dias um texto que me encheu as medidas, um texto que sintetiza muitas das ideias veiculadas no meu trabalho ao longo dos anos, um texto que vai contra muitas das ideias do mainstream, ou não fosse eu um contrarian assumido, um texto que até usa o mesmo tipo de palavras-chave que uso para facilitar a comunicação e que nunca, ou raramente, vi serem utilizadas por outros.
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O texto é "The fatal bias" e começa assim:

"The prevailing managerial bias towards cost efficiency is seriously harmful to corporate performance.
Overall cost leadership is not a viable strategy.
...
Of the 25,000 companies in Raynor and Ahmed’s sample, only a handful achieved strong and sustained success with this strategy. They conclude that: “Very rarely is cost leadership a driver of superior profitability… it could have turned out that price-based competition was systematically more profitable, or that cost leadership took precedence as a driver of superior performance – but it didn’t.”
...
“on average, boards devote nine times more attention to spending and counting cash flow than to wondering where it comes from and how it could be increased”, the implication is clear: there is a perilous bias within many top management teams towards the invariably losing strategy of cost competitiveness."

Ser eficiente é mau? Claro que não!
Não querer desperdiçar é mau? Claro que não!
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O problema é fazer da eficiência e do desperdício os alvos supremos. Por isso, tantas e tantas vezes chamo a atenção para o retorno da atenção, para a necessidade de não ocupar a nossa pequena largura de banda de atenção com tanto enfoque na eficiência, nos desperdícios, nos custos. Por isso, falo sobre a importância do numerador sobre o denominador.
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O denominador encolhe-nos o pensamento, o numerador abre horizontes.

Outra verdade que tento passar no meu contacto e interacção com os empresários ao longo dos anos: uma estratégia baseada no preço não é para quem quer, é para quem pode.
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Outra proposta deste blogue e da minha vida profissional, algo que aprendi recentemente a chamar de obliquidade ao ler John Kay:

"the evidence being that companies whose goals are financial tend to underperform those whose purpose is more visionary.[Moi ici: Por isso, tantas e tantas vezes defendo que o lucro, como o emprego, não são objectivos, são consequências]
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Perhaps, in a similar way, a focus on cost-cutting has the unforeseen consequence of cutting revenues and therefore margins at an even faster pace. What would appear at first glance to be a bold assault on waste and inefficiency turns out to be a careless and costly assault on earlier investments made by even bolder managers in the competitive differentiation of the enterprise."

O que este texto faz é desmascarar tanto e tanto discurso, o que ocupa a maioria do prime time dos media e do ensinamento das universidades, sobre o custo como o factor crítico da competitividade.
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Tanto e tanto empresário que apenas tem como meio de informação a que recorre os media, e os universitários que nele pontuam, já caíram neste conto do vigário dos custos serem a única forma de competir... ser ignorante, assim, é uma vantagem.
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Continua, porque isto tem muito sumo.

Um exemplo das consequências do ROA

"72% of all new products don’t meet their revenue targets. And a quarter of companies, according to the same survey, confess that not one of their new offerings met its profitability goals.
...
what’s causing this high failure rate
...
[when a product fails] it’s not a technology problem or a pure R&D problem — it is really around marketing, customer segments, and of course pricing.
...
Your survey also details how hard some companies are finding it to raise prices. For instance, you found that only a third of all planned price increases actually get implemented, and for every 5% price increase attempted, only about 1.9% is achieved. Why are companies having such a hard time raising prices?
...
One of the odder findings in your survey is that 58% of companies say they are currently in a price war – but 89% of those blame their competitors, not themselves, for starting it. Why does pricing feel so out of executives’ hands?
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[Moi ici: ROA - Return of attention. O tempo que se investe numa coisa não pode ser usado para outra] For many years, CEOs and executives have focused on improving the bottom line through cost cutting, finding efficiencies in operations and the supply chain. Companies have gotten better and better at that. Pricing is also a highly impactful driver of revenue, but companies probably spent the least amount of time on it. Often it’s the most misunderstood driver in a corporate boardroom. It’s not something that gets a lot of attention in business school, relatively speaking. However, it is also one of the easiest things to change and companies tend to be more reactionary [than strategic] about it."

Trechos retirados de "The Silent Killer of New Products: Lazy Pricing"

Recordar "Aumentar preços"

O que alterariam? (parte I)

Olhem para este mapa da estratégia:

Qual é o enfoque estratégico da empresa?
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O que alterariam, só de olhar para o mapa da estratégia?
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Atenção à largura de banda da atenção da equipa de Gestão de Topo, se se concentram demasiado numa coisa, perdem capacidade de se concentrarem noutra coisa. Qual é a prioridade (simplificada)?
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Inovação?
Custo?
Serviço à medida?
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Não podemos, nem devemos ter a veleidade de colocar num balanced scorecard todos os indicadores que a equipa da Gestão de Topo monitoriza.
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Há indicadores que são estratégicos, que têm a ver com a orientação estratégica da organização. Esses indicadores devem fazer parte do balanced scorecard.
.
Há indicadores que são importantes, que a Gestão de Topo gosta de monitorizar, mas que não são estratégicos, são operacionais. Esses indicadores são monitorizados pela Gestão de Topo ou, isoladamente, por membros da Gestão de Topo, porque têm a ver com a execução orçamental, porque têm a ver com as boas-práticas de gestão hierárquica. Esses indicadores não devem fazer parte do balanced scorecard.
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No Twitter, com alguma recorrência, tenho uma conversa sobre a inovação e a eficiência. Do outro lado, dizem-me que não são incompatíveis. Deste lado, tento explicar a minha preocupação. É claro que inovação e eficiência não são incompatíveis. Contudo, porque o retorno das melhorias da eficiência são "imediatos", e o que há a fazer para que ocorram é mais intuitivo, mais concreto e palpável, e mais barato e menos arriscado de implementar, facilmente a preocupação com a eficiência deixa de ser uma saudável preocupação e, passa a ser uma obsessão que tudo subordina.

O problema são os trade-offs. Se a minha organização quiser ser um paradigma de eficiência, não pode ao mesmo tempo querer ser um paradigma de flexibilidade.

.

Recordo o exemplo da Zappos:

"The most efficient way to run a warehouse is to let the orders pile up, so that when a worker walks around picking up orders, the picking density is higher and the worker has less distance to walk. But we're not trying to maximize picking efficiency.
We're trying to maximize the customer experience, which in e-commerce involves getting orders out to customers as quickly as possible."

 Se a estratégia da minha organização passa pela inovação e flexibilidade, então, as preocupações com a eficiência, ainda que honestas, recomendáveis e importantes, não são estratégicas, devem sair do mapa da estratégia e do balanced scorecard.
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Parte II - sem mais informação, só olhando para o mapa da estratégia, o que alterar. E, ao fazê-lo, quais as dúvidas que surgem
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Parte III - com informação recolhida dos média, como poderia ser refeito o mapa da estratégia
.
Continua.

O recurso mais escasso para as PMEs

Em sintonia com o que se escreve por aqui há vários anos, o tempo é o recurso mais escasso das organizações.
.
E ainda é mais escasso para as PMEs, daí a atenção a estes conselhos:

"Honor deadlines from the top down. Project management is worthless if the CEO disrespects deadlines. Make missing deadlines unacceptable at every level. Promote your best time-managers, and make the consequences of missing deadlines clear.
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Ruthlessly cut projects until only critical ones remain. When a company tries to do too much with too few resources, projects inevitably end up late, mediocre, or unfinished.
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Be transparent about a project’s status. In midsize companies, core projects affect every department since the business isn’t big. Leaders must keep team members informed about advances and setbacks, including missed deadlines, to assess the project’s overall progress."

Trecho retirado de "Time Is a Midsize Company’s Most Valuable Resource"

A variável mais preciosa

É, reconheço, um problema que afecta muitas PMEs.
.
O trabalho não é para se fazer, é para se ir fazendo, em muitas falta um sentido de urgência estratégica, tornado cada vez mais importante pela evolução económica para Mongo, para apostar na rapidez, na flexibilidade, na diferenciação, nas pequenas séries:

"The world is littered with the hollowed-out shells of firms that tried to do too much and spent too big trying to grow too fast. [Moi ici: É preciso definir prioridades, é preciso cortar, é preciso aplicar os recursos onde eles trazem mais retorno] Many of those firms were midsize companies; they didn’t have the resources of the big firms to sustain setbacks, nor were they scrappy like most small companies, making do with the resources they had.
...
While poor time management hurts large and small firms as well, it’s especially pernicious at midsize companies. The reason is that they must still move quickly to fend off smaller competitors but must tackle big projects to support growth, deliver enterprise-class service to large customers, and compete with large competitors. All this on a midsized company budget.  Every second counts.
.
Being neither big nor small forces midsize firms to prioritize ruthlessly. To survive downturns and stay focused during upturns, these firms must plan their high-priority initiatives meticulously. And as they do, they need to understand that time is never on their side.
...
Time, not money, is the most important resource for midsized firms. [Moi ici: Recordar "Qual é o recurso mais escasso?"] In order to create a culture which treats time as a valuable commodity in short supply, leadership must believe this. All the project management in the world will go for naught if the CEO disrespects deadlines. Such behavior must become unacceptable at every level. [Moi ici: E aqui é que a porca-torce-o-rabo, queimar um prazo raramente traz consequências na nossa cultura de "gajos porreiros"]"  

Num projecto a terminar na próxima semana, atacado por atrasos sucessivos, por desrespeito dos prazos acordados; e os técnicos são sempre bons a  encontrar desculpas tecnicamente razoáveis, para justificar mais um atraso, uma das formas de voltar a dar à gestão de topo as rédeas da situação foi:

"Expose the status of core projects, warts and all. The status of crucial projects must be made naked to the entire management team – especially when progress slips."

A pressão dos pares é, muitas vezes, mais poderosa que a pressão da gestão de topo.
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Trechos retirados de "Midsize Companies Must Prioritize Ruthlessly"

Um começo praticamente perfeito

E finalmente comecei a leitura de "The Three Rules - How Exceptional Companies Think" de Michael Raynor e Mumtaz Ahmed.
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O primeiro capítulo, "More Than a Fortune Cookie" cumpriu as expectativas na íntegra, o reforço integral da mensagem deste blogue ao longo dos anos.

"How much of each of price and non-price value a company provides relative to its competitors defines its position in competitive space; how a company creates value for its customers.
...
Miracle Workers (Moi ici: Designação que os autores deram às empresas com desempenho excepcional) overwhelmingly had non-price positions... and Average Joes (Moi ici: Designação que os autores deram às empresas com desempenho mediano) typically competed on price.
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More compelling still - and a big part of why we feel a non-price position is a material cause of exceptional performance - we found that when exceptional companies abandoned a non-price position, their performance subsequently suffered.
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There are two dimensions of value along which any company can differentiate itself: price value and non-price value. Our research reveals that exceptional companies typically focus on non-price value, even if that means they have to charge higher prices. It did not have to turn out this way: price-based competition is a legitimate strategy. We have found, however, that competing with better rather than cheaper is systematically associated with superior, long-term performance. (Moi ici: Este parágrafo é, simplesmente, música celestial para este blogue... e recordo "guerras" que perdi, em várias empresas, pela minha incapacidade de defender a via do valor através do não-preço, sobretudo no início desta caminhada. O volume é um atractor poderoso, é uma sereia com um canto quase irresistível)
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Better before cheaper is a useful rule because it applies not just to questions of diversification or focus, but to many critical decisions our Miracle Workers faced. The differences in behavior that best explained the differences in performance were consistent with a bias for increasing non-price value, even if it was sometimes at the expense of being price competitive.
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Of course, no company can afford to ignore its relative price position. That is why the rule is "better before cheaper": being price competitive is far from irrelevant, but when it comes to position in a market, exceptional performance is caused most often by greater non-price value rather than by lower price.
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It turns out that just as there is a pattern in how exceptional companies create value (better before cheaper), there is a pattern in how they capture value.
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Our reserach reveals that exceptional companies are systematically  more likely to drive their ROA advantage through higher relative revenue than by lower relative cost or lower relative assets. Going down one more level, a revenue advantage can be driven by higher unit price or higher unit volume, and exceptional companies tend to rely more on price. (Moi ici: Recordar a série "Sobre a paranóia da eficiência e do eficientismo", "Aumentar o "producer surplus", o caminho menos percorrido (parte IV)" e "Não tente ser o melhor")
...
A company's competitive position defines how it creates value. A company's profitability formula defines how it captures value. Profitability increases when revenue increases, cost decreases, or assets go down. We find that exceptional companies achieve superior profitability with revenue increases, even if that means higher cost or a higher asset base.
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When you find yourself having to allocate scarce resources—usually people, time or money—among competing priorities (which you surely will), think about which initiatives contribute most to enhancing the non-price elements of your position, or to earning relatively higher prices or greater volume, and give those the nod."

Um começo praticamente perfeito para a causa deste blogue.

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E a sua empresa, como está a investir no não-preço? O que está a fazer para ser mais valiosa do que mais barata? O que está a fazer para aumentar o producer surplus?

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Lá em cima os autores falam do indicador ROA (return on assets), aqui no blogue também uso um outro ROA, o return-of-attention, quando o mainstream só fala na eficiência e na redução de custos, é preciso muita perseverança, muito anti-short-termismo, muita personalidade para seguir o caminho menos percorrido e apostar no valor associado ao não-preço.

O Evangelho do Valor - uma pregação sempre deficitária

"Leming marches. We've all heard the managers' lament that "my competitors are slashing prices, so I have to follow."
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Price cuts rarely boost demand by enough to make them worthwhile. (Moi ici: Recordar os números do Evangelho do Valor) The temptation to cut prices is hard to resist. But restraint is almost always a wise and profitable decision. Keep your fingers off the "down" button unless you are absolutely sure of how your customers and competitors will respond.
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Volume worship. If your sales force has pricing authority, it needs proper incentives. Link compensation to profit goals instead of volume or revenue goals. This move helps to counter their natural urge to burn through a price premium just to get product out the door.
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Without personal incentives to price better, managers succumb to the insidious comfort-zone feeling that their current pricing is "good enough." When asked, managers tend to say that knowledge of the customer's willingness to pay is just as important as knowledge of the product's unit costs when it comes to setting prices. But they do not back their words with action. They prefer to scrutinize internal cost data - which, while transparent, is not exactly relevant - rather than to determine objectively what their customers can pay." (Moi ici: Claro! Isto acontece-me tantas vezes que já arranjei uma explicação - o tempo não é elástico, e a largura de banda da mente dos gestores está sempre abaixo da capacidade necessária, problema comum a todos os humanos, se parte dessa largura de banda é gasta a pensar nos custos e na sua redução, pouco ou nada vai sobrar em termos de largura de banda com qualidade, para pensar noutras formas mais inteligentes de ganhar dinheiro como, por exemplo, subir na escala de valor)

Trechos retirados de "Don't Price Away Your Profits" de Frank Bilstein e Frank Luby publicado pelo WSJ Europe em Setembro de 2002.

Quando o palco é invadido por muitos actores...

David Rock em "Your Brain at Work" levanta um tema muito interessante. A mente humana é como um pequeno palco:

"It can hold only a handful of actors at a time. Put too many on, and others get bumped off. With so little space available, it’s easy to get overwhelmed and make mistakes."

Depois, Rock menciona um trabalho que já aqui referi várias vezes, o estudo de Miller e do número sete:

"You’ve probably never heard of George A. Miller, but you may have heard of the outcome of a study he did in 1956. Miller found that the maximum number of items a person can hold in mind at once is seven. The trouble with Miller’s research being so well known is that it’s wrong, or at least often misinterpreted. This misinterpretation may be the cause of universal angst: many people think they have a problem because they can’t hold that much information in mind.
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A wide survey of new research in 2001 by Nelson Cowan, at the University of Missouri–Columbia, found that the number of items you can hold in mind is likely not seven. It’s more like four, and even then this depends on the complexity of the four items. Four numbers, no problem. Four long words, and it starts to get harder. Four sentences, unless the sentences are familiar—a memorized prayer or an advertising jingle—are very difficult indeed to keep in mind. And the participants in these studies were all young adults. Think about it. Four sentences. That’s not a lot. No wonder meetings often seem so chaotic. No one can make sense of what’s going on." 

E, para complicar a situação:

"It gets worse. A study by Brian McElree at New York University found that the number of chunks of information you can remember accurately with no memory degradation is, remarkably, only one. This study states, “There is clear and compelling evidence of one unit being maintained in focal attention and no direct evidence for more than one item of information extended over time.” While you can obviously remember more than one thing at a time, your memory degrades for each item when you hold a lot in mind."

Enquanto ouvia estas palavras, durante o jogging, o meu pensamento - o palco - foi ocupado pelo que acontece nas empresas quando precisam de desenvolver uma nova estratégia. O palco é facilmente invadido por várias ideias novas  em simultâneo.
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E se é invadido por várias ideias novas em simultâneo... não vai ser fácil serem percebidas e vingarem.
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A base do spin está nisto... se a mente está ocupada com um tema (RTP, por exemplo) não vai ter espaço, não vai ter palco, para se dedicar a outra coisa (défice, por exemplo).
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Só vem sublinhar a importância do retorno da atenção (ROA).

Qual o retorno da atenção?

A propósito de "Fórum para a Competitividade diz faltar “quase tudo nas reformas estruturais”, sim, eu sei, o Estado que temos é como um tumor, um parasita burro que está a minar, cada vez mais, a sustentabilidade desta comunidade. Contudo, pergunto: por que é que ao longo dos anos só vejo referido nos media o Fórum para a Competitividade por causa destas coisas?
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Se consultarmos os estatutos do Fórum, no artigo 1º encontramos:

"2. Constitui objecto global do FORUM a promoção do aumento da competitividade de Portugal, através
do estímulo ao desenvolvimento da produtividade nas empresas e...
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3. Para prossecução dos seus fins, o FORUM poderá:
a) Promover acções de apoio às empresas e associações empresariais, visando a melhoria da
gestão empresarial e estimulando a competitividade entre as mesmas;
b) Realizar colóquios, seminários e conferências em áreas de interesse para o
desenvolvimento empresarial;
c) Recolher, tratar e divulgar a informação com interesse para a actividade empresarial,
nomeadamente no que respeita aos meios financeiros de apoio ao desenvolvimento;
d) Promover acções de formação e informação de gestores empresariais, designadamente na
área das novas tecnologias;
e) Cooperar ou filiar-se em organismos nacionais e internacionais;
f) Criar um secretariado permanente de apoio aos gestores empresariais;
g) Desenvolver todos os esforços no sentido de motivar comparticipações financeiras para o
desenvolvimento da sua actividade empresarial;
h)Promover a racional aplicação e rentabilização dos meios, materiais ou de “know-how”,
postos a sua disposição pelos associados ou por terceiros."

Por que nunca vejo o Fórum mencionado por causa das acções listadas em 3?
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Talvez seja interessante recordar "Creating Competitive Advantage" de Pankaj Ghemawat e Jan Rivkin:
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"Some companies generate far greater profits than others.
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large differences in economic performance are commonplace. Understanding their roots is crucial for strategists."
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Existem diferenças na rentabilidade entre os vários sectores económicos:

Mas muito mais interessante é a parte que se segue:
"industry averages can mask large differences in economic profit within industries.
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Indeed, recent research indicates that intra-industry differences in profitability like those shown in Figures ...

 may be larger than differences across industries such as those in [na primeira figura] Industry-level effects appear to account for 10-20% of the variation in business profitability while stable within-industry effects account for 30-45%."
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Por que será?
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Costumo escrever que o recurso mais escasso que os gestores têm é o tempo... o tempo gasto com uma coisa não pode ser gasto noutra... qual o retorno da atenção?
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E a sua empresa?
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Dentro do seu sector de actividade económica, onde é que ela se encaixa? No grupo com rentabilidades superiores ou no grupo com rentabilidades inferiores? Não está a precisar de um pouco de estratégia? Não sofre da doença de querer servir todo o tipo de clientes? Não sofre da doença da falta de alinhamento e da falta de mosaico?