Courage is one of the scarcest commodities there is

“Too many firms have made growth and size, rather than differentiation, their strategic priority. Instead of identifying and executing a clear market positioning, many companies and firms have consciously pursued a policy of “If you need it, we can do it!”
…
“staying focused and true to a strategy has been, and always will be, hard to do.
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The hunger for volume has meant that many individuals and firms are uncomfortable with (or even shocked by) the notion that, to achieve a distinctive strategy, they will need to turn away work that a major competitor may reasonable want to serve.”
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“you can’t get the benefits of a strategy that you don’t implement, and half measures are unlikely to work. Strategy is not about understanding something – or planning to get around to it. It’s about having the courage to make it happen. You can’t let other people, even clients, determine the pace at which you create your distinctiveness.”
…
“Courage is one of the scarcest commodities there is. That’s why it’s a significant source of competitive advantage!”

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Trechos retirados de "Strategy and the Fat Smoker" de David Maister

Ganhar competitividade reduzindo a complexidade

"A strategy is not just choosing a target market, but actally designing an operation that will consistently deliver the superior client benefits you claim to provide." (Moi ici: O sumo que se encerra nesta frase!!! Quando escolhemos um mercado-alvo, quando escolhemos um tipo de clientes-alvo, se os queremos servir bem, se os queremos servir com vantagem competitiva, temos de transformar a nossa organização numa máquina dedicada, concentrada, alinhada, sintonizada em servir esses clientes-alvo)

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"Strategy is deciding whose business you are going to turn away" (Moi ici: Assim, se escolhemos um tipo como os clientes-alvo, se transformamos a nossa organização numa máquina dedicada a servi-los bem, transformamos a nossa organização numa máquina pouco competitiva para servir outros tipos de clientes)

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"As companies keep discovering to their detriment, it is certain business decay if you try to plase all possible market segments. The broader the group of clients to which you try to appeal, or the wider the range of services you try to provide, the less customized your operation can be to each segment within that group.

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If you never say "no," you will just be one more undifferentiated firm, trying to do a little bit of everything and, as Skinner pointed out, will almost certainly be superb at none of them" (Moi ici: Esta semana tive uma reunião com o gerente de uma pequena empresa cheia, repleta, atolada de trabalho, que já descobriu isto sozinho. Em vez de ter uma empresa que faz tudo e recorrer a subcontratados que não cumprem, que não têm qualidade, que não sabem dizer não... Por que não ter duas empresas: uma para as grandes séries e trabalhos baratos e, outra para a nata. Para uma o preço como factor competitivo (order winner), para outra o preço como factor higiénico (order qualifier) (Terry Hill))

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Trechos retirados de "Strategy and the Fat Smoker" de David Maister

Os verdelhões, os papa-moscas, os chapins, os ...

... alimentam o cuco até não dar mais.

"90% dos aumentos de impostos entre 1995 e 2008 foi para pagar o aumento da massa salarial na Função Pública" (Medina Carreira no programa Plano Inclinado na SIC-N de ontem)

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Depois, os cucos ainda se queixam da qualidade da gestão dos verdelhões, chapins e companhia...

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No entanto, são estas pequenas empresas, anónimas, sem tempo para frequentar os corredores e tapetes do poder, que mantêm este país a funcionar:

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"Ervas aromáticas biológicas seduzem paladares"

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"Indústrias têxtil e de vestuário com optimismo moderado"

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ADENDA: Estes chapins trabalham como desalmados para continuar a alimentar o cuco "Teixeira dos Santos mantém tabu sobre congelamentos salariais em 2011"

Simplex

Ontem à noite no programa Plano Inclinado da SIC-N, João Duque referia que tinha lido o CV de todos os ministros do actual governo e tinha constatado que nem um tinha feito parte dos corpos sociais de uma empresa privada.

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O que é que se aprende quando se trabalha nos dias de hoje numa empresa privada que não vive à custa do Estado? Que não opera no mercado dos bens não transaccionáveis?

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Uma dessas coisas é a importância de servir os clientes.

Ganhar dinheiro é uma consequência de conseguir satisfazer os clientes de forma sustentada.

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Uma outra dessas coisas é a importância da rapidez.

Se se é lento, compete-se pelo preço, compete-se pelo que já não é novidade, não se tem grande futuro. Se se é rápido, tem-se uma vantagem competitiva.

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Para que é que existe o Instituto da Mobilidade e dos Transportes Terrestres? Qual a sua razão de ser? Qual a sua finalidade?

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"Seis centímetros atrasam autocarros de dois pisos há meio ano"

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BTW, onde é que 90 lugares sentados e 40 de pé dão 150?

Retrato rápido da evolução salarial na Alemanha em 2009

"Des salaires de base légèrement plus dynamiques en Allemagne qu’en France en 2009"

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E ainda vamos descobrir que os custos unitários do trabalho voltaram a baixar...

Não é a mesma coisa

Krugman continua a laborar no erro do costume: gastar não é o mesmo que investir.

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Gastar gasta-se, no momento em que acaba o dinheiro acaba-se o incentivo para a continuação da tarefa.

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Investir é diferente, quando se esgota o dinheiro inicial do investimento, se o investimento foi bem feito, já o retorno do mesmo permite manter e fazer crescer o empreendimento.

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Faz-me lembrar a passagem do triângulo do fogo para o tetraedro do fogo, se não houver reacção em cadeia... não há tetraedro

Vai ser assim

Este é um sintomas do princípio do fim...

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... do fim deste estado de coisas, do apodrecimento da situação, do fim das ilusões:

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"Estradas de Portugal sem dinheiro para pagar as SCUT"

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"Bancos recusam crédito à Estradas de Portugal"

Cover the Canvas

Ao desenvolver e implementar um sistema de gestão da qualidade não gosto de perder muito tempo com a versão inicial da documentação que descreve o funcionamento dos processos.

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Não por que não veja valor nesses documentos, mas por que acredito que demasiado investimento à procura da versão inicial ideal retira ímpeto, retira momentum ao projecto. Por outro lado, ao concluir rapidamente a documentação limita-se, traça-se uma fronteira em torno do projecto... até lá, há sempre uma sensação de algo incerto, algo difuso, não se conhece onde acaba o trabalho. Por outro lado, assim que acaba a cartografia rápida, podem-se iniciar as auditorias no terreno e, a partir daí, aparecerão sucessivas versões mais completas, mais adequadas.

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Ontem, deparei com este texto que explica a metodologia que sigo de forma muito mais clara "Cover the Canvas":

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"Why Cover the Canvas works

The genius of this conception is twofold. First, we discover that the strongpoints we’ve bypassed often melt away by themselves. Second, once we’ve reached our objective, however shakily, the enemy frequently gives up. He can’t believe we’re on his doorstep. He waves the white flag.

Our enemy as artists is Resistance. If we make the mistake in our first draft of playing perfectionist, if we agonize over syntax and take a week to finish Chapter One, by the time we’ve reached Chapter Four, we’ll have hit the wall. Resistance will beat us.

But if we can stay nimble and keep advancing, slapping paint on the canvas and words on the page till we’ve got something that works from east to west and north to south, however imperfectly, then we’re like Mattis’ Marines on the threshold of Baghdad. True, we’ve got plenty more fighting to do, but at least we’re here. We’ve got something we can work with."

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Podemos recordar "O sentido de urgência é um must"

Bandeira ou algo mais?

O que se pretende com a certificação do sistema de gestão da qualidade de uma organização? Uma bandeira ou algo mais?

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De vez em quando encontro empresas certificadas com objectivos da qualidade que não passam de treta, são genéricos, infantis e nada têm a ver com o negócio.

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"2. Auditing quality objectives
Auditors need to verify that the organization’s overall quality objectives have been defined, that they reflect the quality policy, are substantially coherent, aligned and compatible with the overall business objectives, including customer expectations. (Moi ici: Treta, quantas vezes deparo com empresas certificadas e com objectivos da qualidade da treta, objectivos sem qualquer relação com o negócio) If this is not the case, the auditors should further evaluate Top Management commitment to quality. (Moi ici: LOL)
The fulfilment of quality objectives needs to be measurable and documented.
There is no specified way of identifying or documenting quality objectives, as these may appear through business plans, management review outputs, annual budgets, etc. It is up to the auditors to satisfy themselves that the objectives are adequately documented.
The auditors should obtain evidence of the way the quality objectives are suitably cascaded throughout the organization’s structure and processes, linking the general strategic objectives to management objectives and down to specific operational activities. (Moi ici:LOL, brincamos. Até parece que muitos auditores de terceira parte não conhecem estas linhas de orientação)
It is recommended that the documented quality objectives should be examined at the
documentation review stage of the audit.
Before the end of the audit, the auditors have to satisfy themselves that the quality objectives are realistic and relevant, and that the organization has assigned to responsible personnel the resources needed to meet their objectives. Evidence of this should be obtained at all levels of the organization.
Quality objectives are not static and need to be updated in the light of the current business climate and the quest for continual improvement. Auditors should verify that the overall performance of the organization reflects the aims of the quality policy and reasonably meets the quality objectives.
Auditors should keep in mind that the fulfilment of objectives can be measured in a quantitative or qualitative manner. They should also remember that there is a clear link between the dynamic aspects of revising the quality policy and the quality objectives and the commitment of the organization to continual improvement."

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Trecho retirado de "ISO 9001 Auditing Practices Group Guidance on: Auditing Quality Policy, Quality Objectives and Management Review"

A acontecer... será um autêntico day of reckoning

"Legal noose tightens on Europe's monetary union":

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"Contrary to general belief, Germany’s eurosceptic professors have not abandoned their legal efforts to block the EU rescues for European banks exposed to Greek debt, and since May 7 for banks exposed to debt from Spain, Portugal, and Ireland as well.

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Should they succeed, of course, the eurozone risks disintegration within days, and perhaps hours. I am not sure that investors in New York, London, Tokyo, Beijing, or indeed Frankfurt quite understand this."

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Alguém quer fornecer um modelo alternativo que explique estas observações?

Factos:

• Os salários alemães (parte Ocidental) entre 2002 e 2007 subiram 9%; (daqui)
• Os custos unitários do trabalho na Alemanha, durante a primeira década do século XXI subiram 20% menos que na Europa do Sul; (daqui)
• Os preços no produtor, na Alemanha, durante a primeira década do século XXI tiveram esta evolução: (daqui)
• Exportações alemãs de vento em poupa e desemprego a baixar (daqui)

Entretidos com folhetins nacionais socialistas

Todos contra a Telefónica...

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Entretanto a dura realidade continua a minar os alicerces onde assenta este estado de coisas:

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"EMU break-up risks global deflation shock that would dwarf Lehman collapse, warns ING"

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"Breakup of single currency would blight Europe, says Dutch bank Ing"

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"Spain’s sand-castle exposure"

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Produtividade e salários ou O jogo do gato e do rato (parte VI)

"Setting aside whether or not such programs would be effective, an implicit assumption is that higher productivity will turn into higher wages. However, although this relationship was once fairly solid -- changes in productivity translated into real wage gains -- it has not held up in recent decades. The growth in wages has lagged behind the growth in productivity:
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productivity growth is supposed to yield improved economic outcomes via higher real wages. Yet ... labor's share of output has been steadily decreasing since the early 1980s. This downward trend was interrupted by gains evident during the tech bubble of the mid-1990s. Apparently, only during that brief, shining moment of generational technological change did the productivity story work as we believe it should, at least since the early 1980's.

Gains in productivity won't work the wonders described above if they don't translate into gains in real income for the working class. The fact that wages are not keeping up with productivity, something that should happen when markets function well, indicates something is awry in the distribution of gains in the economy. The cause of this is the source of much controversy, and some say nothing is awry at all -- it's just that the "skill premium" has increased substantially causing the distribution of income to become more skewed. But some of the highest rewards for increases in productivity went to people in the financial industry, and we know now that those productivity gains weren't really there -- the rewards were based on an illusion rather than something real. And I don't think the change in the skill premium is the whole story in any case. The reduction in the ability of labor to bargain on an equal footing with employers due to the decline in unions and other forces also played an important role in holding down real wages in recent decades." (daqui)

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Voltemos à figura:

Antigamente, o aumento da produtividade acontecia sobretudo à custa da diminuição dos custos, do aumento da eficiência. No entanto, nesse tempo, não só a concorrência não era tão forte e tão omnipresente, como a globalização não tinha chegado aos Low-Cost-Manufacturing-Countries (LCMC). Assim, nesses tempos, os ganhos de produtividade podiam ser distribuídos entre o capital e o trabalho de forma mais equitativa.

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Ainda, nesses tempos, como se pode aprender no livro "The Lords of Strategy" de Walter Kiechel III o mundo competitivo era muito mais infantil, mais naíve e carregado de mistério (na linha do que Roger Martin define no seu livro "The Design of Business")

Hoje, o que antes era um mistério, foi traduzido, e transformado em linhas de código de um qualquer algoritmo.

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Assim, hoje, perante um excesso de capacidade produtiva e perante a inexistência de mistérios, é a própria sobrevivência das empresas que é posta em causa ao canalizar as magras e raquíticas décimas de ponto percentual de aumento da produtividade para salários. Basta atentar nesta série recente "O jogo do gato e do rato" (especial a parte IV e a parte I, com a tirada do ministro TdS.)

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Voltando à primeira figura deste postal... quem me conhece já sabe qual a receita que proponho para vencer este paradoxo... fujam da guerra dos custos que só vos levará à anorexia da Red Queen.

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Só a concentração na criação de valor, só a concentração no numerador da equação da produtividade permitirá compensar melhor os trabalhadores, sem pôr em causa a competitividade das empresas.

Começar pelo fim!!!

Há muito que defendo neste blogue o começar pelo fim, o começar pelo ponto de chegada. O que fazemos é instrumental, é o que nos faz chegar ao porto ambicionado. Por isso, já escrevemos, por exemplo: "Formação de auditores que começa pelo fim"; "Mais uma vez - Começar pelo fim é precioso!"; e sobretudo "Mais uma vez e sempre: Começar pelo fim!!!".

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Mais uma achega para defesa desta abordagem "Start At The End":

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"I’ve just finished a really interesting book, The Sinai Campaign by Moshe Dayan, the great Israeli general. Dayan, facing the Egyptian army in 1956, did the same thing Stallone did. He worked backwards from the end. He figured out what the Israeli Defense Forces needed to accomplish, politically as well as militarily, to extricate themselves from a dangerous situation (Egyptian terrorism, a blockade of the straits of Tiran, etc.) Then he figured out what actions were necessary to get to that place.

Another way to look at this principle is to think of it in terms of leadership. What service does a leader perform? A leader defines the goal. (In writing terms, he figures out the climax of the story; in biz terms, he articulates where the organization wants to go.) Then he turns to his colleagues and says, “Okay, ladies and gentlemen, figure out how to get us there.”

For us, as artists and entrepreneurs, we have to be the leader and the working stiffs. Part of us has to define the goal–what’s the finish? what’s the climax? where do we want this train to end up? The other part has to figure out what specific actions we need to take to get us there.

I’m not saying Start At The End is the only way to do this. But it’s a sound principle that applies across a whole range of disciplines. Work back-to-front. It works."

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Para quem nunca experimentou, um conselho: Tentem!!!

E o que tem sido a economia portuguesa favorecida pelo centralismo dos governos?

"But let's be honest here. Nothing is being stimulated. All that's happening is that the government is taking over more and more of the economy, so as to keep more and more of it "moving" by centralized dictat. If that's the goal, then so be it, but to think that somehow demand is magically being created is silly."
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"Let's Be Honest About What "Stimulated Demand" Really Means"

Este polvo chamado Paul

É uma metáfora muito boa para usar nas empresas que 'inventam' demasiado criando relações de causa-efeito mirabolantes, só para justificar o injustificável.

Por que a abordagem por processos é fundamental

"No one diet idea is free of flaws or drawbacks. The best diet for you is the one you will stick to.
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Your firm needs to debate the following questions if you really want to pursue this or any other strategic goal:

• Which “diet,” if integrated into the normal running of the firm, would actually get us to perform at the level required to achieve the benefits we seek?
• Which would we be prepared to adopt as a central part of our regular lifestyle?
• If we don’t like any of these diets, can we think of another that will have as much force as these, but that we could live with more easily?

If there is no specific diet that all your people can agree to follow, then you must conclude that you are not really willing or able to pursue that strategic goal.
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If all business improvement is like curing a fat smoker or helping an alcoholic recover, then what actually motivates people and organizations to change?
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We all know the main thing that works: a major crisis! (Moi ici: A velha burning platform... a grande criador do sentido de urgência)
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A major source of failure in implementing sensible business strategies is that we underestimate how much effort is truly required to bring about significant improvement. Individuals and organizations frequently fail to incorporate the new activities into their dayli lives. Strategic actions are viewed as special, separate events rather than regular business activities. In other words, there’s real life, and then there’s the diet. (Moi ici: As acções estratégicas, as iniciativas estratégicas, são projectos, são transientes, são eventos especiais. É fundamental incorporar, embeber, as mudanças trazidas pelas iniciativas naquilo que é permanente, naquilo que é a rotina, nos processos. Ou seja, a abordagem por processos.)
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Viewed that way, all improvement programs are doomed to failure. As my trainer has pointed out, you don’t really get the sustained benefits of exercise until it has become as routine and is as natural as brushing your teeth and taking a shower each day.
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Anything less than that will jeopardize any short-term gains you may obtain with bursts of activity. It’s about routines, not special events."

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BTW, sempre que os governos falam de austeridade e PECs é possível visualizar mudanças nos hábitos e nos comportamentos? Ou não são antes suspensões temporárias do regabofe, ou não são antes um "suster a respiração" por momentos até que se possa voltar a respirar em força.

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Eheheh... a densidade, o substrato de quem gere este país é tão superficial como a camada de húmus no deserto do Saara. Há um ano os líderes de Banco de Portugal queriam aumentar-se em 5%... lembram-se?

Trecho retirado de "Strategy and the Fat Smoker" de David Maister

Jorge Sampaio é um aprendiz de ilusionista

Tem medo do desemprego que quer minorar, apoiando as empresas existentes em dificuldades, a manutenção do nível de investimento (eufemismo usado por políticos para gastos sem retorno positivo). Em simultâneo, quer que a nova estrutura produtiva apareça do nada sem mais nem menos.

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Enfim, mais um que gosta das renováveis às segundas, terças e quartas e protesta contra as tarifas da electricidade às quintas, sextas e sábado.

TGV em Espanha

Acerca do TGV em Espanha, é de ler os comentários no Facebook de Edward Hugh e este texto "About AVE (Spanish High-Speed Trains)"

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Por cá vamos no mesmo deboche de endividamento.

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"The cost of the AVE project so far comes to about 50 billion euros. The passenger/kilometre ratio is 2.8 (compare 41.5 in France). The yearly maintenance cost is between 28,000 and 33,000 euros/km. When all the projected lines have been built and are operational, the maintenance costs will run to some 120 million euros a year. (Moi ici: Ah! São Lucas....) According to the International Union of Railways (UIC), an average of 6 million passengers are needed for any line just to cover its maintenance costs: the most successful one so far in Spain (Barcelona-Madrid) carries around 5 million passengers a year, and the Madrid-Seville line just over 3 million. The US Secretary of Transportation, Ray LaHood, was very impressed when he came to Spain to gather information about a possible high-speed train project in America. Until he saw the bill. His comment: “You guys are rich. We can’t afford anything like this.”

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Is PowerPoint a media?

Excelente ajuda à reflexão

Comparações...

Por cá mandam-nos comer sopa... quanto é que descontamos para a Segurança Social (esse esquema Ponzi montado para servir a geração maio de 68 até ao fim)? E quanto é que descontam os empregadores?

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É comparar com as percentagens na Alemanha... "Alemães passam a descontar 8,2% do salário para a Saúde"

A lógica da filosofia das SCUTs

Já repararam que um dos truques que os compradores profissionais aprendem é o de considerar a minimização do custo do produto a adquirir não no acto da compra mas ao longo do ciclo de vida do produto.

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Assim, são capazes de pagar mais no acto de compra de um produto porque sabem que ao longo do ciclo de vida desse produto esse excesso vai ser mais do que compensado.

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Não é exactamente o contrário da filosofia sobre a qual assentam as SCUTS?

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Paga-se menos no acto de compra e muito mais ao longo do ciclo de vida do produto?

Vale a pena recuar a Setembro de 2007

Setembro de 2007, ainda nem se sabia que existia um banco chamado Northern Rock (BTW, solid as a rock, pois).

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Já na altura aqui se falava de SCUTS e do Evangelho de São Lucas "Evangelho segundo São Lucas 14, 25-33"

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O ministro Pinho e os seus próximos ainda navegavam num mundo que já não existia, ele é que ainda não sabia.

Culture eats strategy for lunch

Mais um interessante postal de Spinek "Spot The Northwest Flight Attendant" e, é tão fácil a gestão ficar cega a esta realidade.

"Do Differentiation Differently"

Os clientes não são abstracções estatísticas, são entidades únicas, entidades concretas.

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Um cliente não é um segmento.

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"I always look (metaphorically) into my customer's eyes and formulate virtual questions."
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Seteve Yastrow recorda e reforça esta tese com o postal "Do Differentiation Differently":

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"Your customer doesn't really care if you are different. But he will be blown away if he sees that you think he is different.
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Most marketing and sales theory doesn't approach customers in this way. We talk about target markets and demographics, which, instead of recognizing what makes each customer unique, is a way of grouping customers by what makes them similar. We talk about product positioning and unique selling propositions, which is all about us and only incidentally about the customer.
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Flip your thinking around. Focus on differentiating your customers.
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Take Notice
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Put your customer hat on: How much effort do companies expend telling you about themselves vs. the amount of time they spend trying to learn what makes you different? Are there companies that demonstrate that they understand what makes you unique, by interacting with you in a way that is singular and relevant only to you? How do you feel about these companies, relative to those that clump you together with the rest of the "target market?""

We are here

"Once the voting franchise of the West reached the point where those who sought benefits outweighed those who created benefits, the tipping point was reached. The situation of de facto “class warfare” thus emerges automatically under such circumstances, and the envy of those who take against those who provide erupts into “rights” and “entitlement”. By deifying “democracy” above justice, the enfranchised non-producers could always outvote the producers. We are at this point. The result can only be collapse, or restructuring around a Cæsar or a Bonaparte until, eventually, a productive hierarchy reappears, usually after considerable pain."
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Texto retirado daqui: "Guest Post: The New Civil Wars Within The West"

Melhoria contínua vs inovação

Ontem, numa empresa que se distingue pela aposta na inovação, ao discutirmos o texto das suas prioridades estratégicas, pesava-se a eventual incompatibilidade entre inovação e melhoria contínua.

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Interessante que hoje tenha dado de caras com este artigo "The seduction of routine (and other obstacles to spotting opportunities)":

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"“Routine,” according to the English philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, “is the god of every social system.” Standardizing an ad hoc process-from cooking hamburgers at McDonalds to assembling cars at Toyota-increases efficiency, reduces waste, and paves the way for continuous improvement. During the past sixty years, a series of process management tools, including total quality management and lean manufacturing, have spread rapidly. These tools all aim to identify defects, such as burnt Big Macs or defective radios in a Camry. Six sigma, and similar techniques, make perfect sense for improving high volume activities such as fast food preparation and manufacturing, where deviations annoy customers. Striving for zero defects in all activities, however, discourages experimentation and hampers learning. More subtly, it dulls sensitivity to anomalies, which are coded as as defects to be eliminated rather than clues to be explored. Process management has its place-typically the factory or the back office-but an obsessive devotion to routinization devalues the incongruities and serendipity that often signal opportunities."

Hum...

"Fundo de protecção do euro viola constituição alemã e direito europeu"

A geração que fez o Maio de 68 ...

... vai sugar-nos a todos até ao fim.

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Só a Lei da Vida vai salvar os que vieram depois...

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"Dictatorship of the dying"

Inveja

"Germany focuses on cutting spending"

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"argue that by curbing spending – rather than increasing taxes – the €80bn ($100.3bn, £66bn) savings programme would differ “fundamentally” from previous fiscal squeezes and offer “noticeable, better growth possibilities”."

Strategy and the Fat Smoker (parte I)

Do livro "Strategy and the Fat Smoker" de David Maister retiro:

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"What is very hard is actually doing what you know to be good for you in the long-run, in spite of short-run temptations.
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In the past two-and-a-half decades, I have been trusted to see a large number of strategic plans from a wide variety of professional firms around the world, including direct competitors. What is immediately noteworthy is how similar (if not identical) they all are.
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This is not because anyone is being stupid, but because everyone is smart. Every competitor is smart enough to analyze the market and spot which sectors are growing and which are in decline. Few competitors get it wrong. Everyone - absolutely everyone - can see which services and products are "hot" and which are becoming commodities.
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What is more, everyone understands the basis of business success: provide outstanding client service, act like team players, provide a good place to work, invest in your future. No sensible firm (or person) would enunciate a strategy that advocated anything else.
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However, just because something is obvious doesn't make it easy. Real strategy lies not in figuring out what to do, but in devising ways to ensure that, compared to others, we actually do more of what everybody knows they should do.
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Real strategy lies not in figuring out what to do, but in devising ways to ensure that, compared to others, we actually do more of what everybody knows they should do.
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We know what to do, we know why we should do it, and we know how to do it. Yet most businesses and individuals don't do what's good for them.
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The rewards (and pleasure) are in the future; the disruption, discomfort and discipline needed to get there are immediate.
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The necessary outcome of strategic planning is not analytical insight but resolve."
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Este último ponto "is not analytical insight but resolve" é fundamental... é, por vezes, desesperante, como reflectimos aqui: "O sentido da urgência", "Instilar um sentido de urgência!" e "Procrastinação e falta de sentido de urgência".

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Em linha com um artigo de Junho de 2008 da Harvard Business Review "The Secrets to Successful Strategy Execution":

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"Employees at three out of every five companies rated their organization weak at execution—that is, when asked if they agreed with the statement “Important strategic and operational decisions are quickly translated into action,” the majority answered no.
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Execution is the result of thousands of decisions made every day by employees acting according to the information they have and their own self-interest. In our work helping more than 250 companies learn to execute more effectively, we’ve identified four fundamental building blocks executives can use to influence those actions—clarifying decision rights, designing information flows, aligning motivators, and making changes to structure.)"

Para reflexão

"How To Fix A Sovereign Debt Crisis Without Killing Consumer Spending"

Ignorância e caviar, uma mistura explosiva

"Empresas de Terceiro Mundo" um postal de Daniel Oliveira no blogue "Arrastão".

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Nele pode ler-se:

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"Segundo o estudo, 61,3 por cento dos trabalhadores por conta de outrem têm até ao terceiro ciclo do ensino básico, 20,4 por cento têm o ensino secundário e 18,3 por cento o ensino superior. Nos patrões, os números mudam um pouco: 71,7 por cento têm até ao terceiro ciclo do ensino básico, 12,2 por cento o ensino secundário e 16,1 por cento o ensino superior. Ou seja, há muito mais trabalhadores com o ensino secundário completo (mais 67,2 por cento) e com o ensino superior (mais 13,7 por cento) do que empresários.

Como não é plausível que quem tem melhores qualificações tenha menos apetência para o risco, é possível tirar daqui outras conclusões. (Moi ici: Não é plausível? Com que bases é feita esta afirmação? Ver nota 1)

O que estes números evidenciam é que, para além de alguns empresários em nome individual que são, na realidade, trabalhadores por conta de outrem, grande parte do nosso tecido empresarial é de tipo familiar, dirigido por pessoas com uma baixíssima preparação técnica. Não sucede assim nos países realmente desenvolvidos. Não só as pequenas empresas têm menor peso na economia (Moi ici: Caro Daniel Oliveira o único país do mundo onde tal acontece, as grandes empresas representarem a maioria do tecido empresarial, é na Rússia, por legado da economia centralizada para os oligarcas. Em qualquer país europeu as PMEs representam a maioria das empresas e do emprego. Recordar que em Portugal as 1000 maiores empresas representam cerca de 8% do emprego. Ver nota 2) como, mesmo para dirigir uma pequeníssima empresa, é exigível algum grau de preparação." (Moi ici: Pronto, se o BE chegar ao poder as PME's serão expropriadas a quem não for doutor, engenheiro ou arquitecto. Olha, lá se vai a Inarbel...)

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Nota 1: "4. Os estudantes universitários portugueses demonstram intenções empreendedoras?
Os estudantes universitários portugueses, sendo os futuros agentes de desenvolvimento da sociedade e do tecido empresarial português, não demonstram grandes intenções empreendedoras. O estudo desenvolvido pelo Observatório do Empreendedorismo de Base Tecnológica (2005) mostra que 40,8% dos alunos inquiridos não manifestam intenções empreendedoras, sendo que 7% revelam intenções empreendedoras e apenas 5,1% revelam fortes intenções empreendedoras."

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Nota 2: "SMEs represented 99.8 % of all EU-27 enterprises in the non-financial business economy in 2006, employing two thirds of the workforce (67.4 %) and generating 57.7 % of total value added;" ... "SMEs employed 81.0 % of the non-financial business economy workforce in Italy in 2006, a share that fell close to 50 % in Slovakia and the United Kingdom;"

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BTW, por que é que só as empresas que não têm licenciados à sua frente é que vão à falência nestes tempos que correm? E empresas como a Qimonda?

Ideias interessantes sobre o turismo

Há tempos disseram-me que durante o ano de 2010 vão abrir 17 hotéis na cidade do Porto.

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Eheheh, há aqui muito 'optimismo não documentado' em simultâneo.

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Lembrei-me deste facto por causa de um título do Caderno de Economia do semanário Expresso de ontem "Há hotéis de 4 estrelas a €20 por dia em Albufeira"

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Trata-se de uma interessante entrevista com André Jordan. Alguns destaques:

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"Vê solução para as quebras do mercado inglês, em particular no golfe?

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Eu vendi os campos de golfe de Vilamoura em 2007, e já naquela altura, em pleno boom, defendia que era preciso criar um Portugal Golf Club, no modelo dos programas de fidelização das companhia aéreas, para criar uma ligação do cliente ao destino. Se a operação for impessoal, no ano seguinte o cliente vai para outro local, porque é mais barato. Mas ninguém aprovou a ideia: dava trabalho, era mais fácil trabalhar com os tour operators. Perdemos 30% do mercado do golfe, é preciso recuperá-lo com acções de fidelização, não a baixar preços. Há hotéis de quatro estrelas em Albufeira a cobrar €20 por dia. Não podemos entrar nisso, mais vale fechar."

...

"Há sempre uma saída, temos de a procurar colectivamente. Sozinho, ninguém tem capacidade para disputar o mercado, mas juntos podemos fazê-lo."

...

"Toda a crise é igual, parece que é o fim. Só que Portugal não acabou. E não é olhar a crise como uma tempestade no céu e ninguém pode fazer nada: temos de reagir, atacar o mercado."

...

"Se ficarmos parados, saímos do mapa. Não sou burro nem teimoso, penso em termos prospectivos, acho que há sempre clientes aí fora, é preciso ir buscá-los."

...

"Tem dito que não é com discotecas na praia que se promove um destino como o Algarve.

Já nem quero comentar o problema Algarve. Quem tem de fazer a promoção não são as regiões de turismo, são os empresários, os que têm o dinheiro no fogo, embora apoiados com linhas de crédito, juros baicos ou benesses fiscais."

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Alguém que sabe qual o segmento que persegue e que não se ilude com fogo de artifício.

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Outras interrogações sobre o turismo algarvio e I wonder.

É hoje!!!

Processos vs estrutura (parte II)

Continuado daqui.
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Voltando ao artigo “The Decision-Driven Organization” de Marcia Blenko, Michael Mankins e Paul Rogers, publicado pela Harvard Business Review do mês de Junho de 2010.
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“The Six Steps to Decision-Driven Reorganization
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Identify your organization’s key decisions (Moi ici: Tendo em conta os clientes-alvo, tendo em conta a proposta de valor, quais os factores críticos para o sucesso?)
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Determine where in the organization those decisions should happen (Moi ici: Quais são os processos críticos para o sucesso da estratégia?)
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Organize the macrostructure around sources of value (Moi ici: Melhorar os processos críticos para o sucesso da estratégia. Faz muito mais sentido do que melhorar a macro-estrutura)
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Figure out what level of authority decision makers need (Moi ici: Para fazer com que os processos críticos fluam da melhor forma).
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Align other elements of the organizational system, such as incentives, information flow, and processes, with those related to decision making (Moi ici: Mais uma vez, a sinergia das partes do modelo de negócio, ou a perspectiva de recursos e infraestruturas encadeada com a perspectiva dos processos)
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Help managers develop the skills and behaviors necessary to make and execute decisions quickly and well. (Moi ici: Em função dos processos críticos para a execução da estratégia, quais as funções críticas para a tomada de decisões e para o fluxo dos processos críticos)
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IMHO: Faz muito mais sentido assentar a transformação nos processos do que no organigrama.

Um tema recorrente porque importante e actual

"When companies underestimate low-cost rivals"
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"Executives always regret it when they don’t anticipate the scope of a low-cost threat and respond forcefully. To be sure, a failure to see competitors is an example of the forces of “creative destruction” at work in capitalism. But companies alert enough to identify the nature and magnitude of the challenge will be in a better position to find ways to hold the new competitors at bay."

Uma lição interessante

"Lessons We Can Learn On How Stimulus And Jobs Programs Failed In Eastern Germany"

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"Today, the eastern German economy is still in a sorry state, and there are no indications that the situation will change. An estimated €1.3 trillion ($1.6 trillion) have flowed from the former West Germany to the former East Germany over the last 20 years. But what has that money achieved?

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Historic neighborhoods have been restored, new autobahns built and the telephone network brought up to date, but most of the money was spent on social benefits such as welfare payments. The anticipated economic upswing failed to materialize."

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Hummmm!!! Onde é que já vimos cenas destas?

Depois o burro sou eu...

Durante os primeiros 9 meses do ano passado utilizei várias vezes os marcadores:

• sei o que não me disseste na última campanha eleitoral
• moscas, por causa de 42 partes do título "Acordar as moscas que estão a dormir"
• desde que ouvi o ministro pinho dizer que a crise financeira não afectará a economia

Pois... depois o burro sou eu...

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"Maioria dos portugueses aguarda mais aumentos de impostos e não vai de férias"

Processos vs estrutura

Já escrevi várias vezes neste blogue o quanto aprecio a abordagem por processos, a visão horizontal da organização, a visão que se concentra no que há por fazer, a visão que se focaliza na finalidade do trabalho executado.
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No número de Junho, a revista Harvard Business Review publica "The Decision Driven Organization", um artigo de Michael Mankins, Marcia Blenko e Paul Rogers.
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"Many CEOs assume that organizational structure—the boxes and lines on a company’s org chart—is a key determinant of financial performance.
...
nearly half of all CEOs launch a reorg during their first two years on the job. Some preside over repeated restructurings. The immediate motives vary. Some are about cutting costs; others are about promoting growth. Some are about shaking up a culture; others are about shifting strategic focus. Whatever the specifics, though, reorgs almost always involve making major structural changes in pursuit of better performance.
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Despite the fanfare that usually greets them, however, most reorganizations fall flat. A recent Bain & Company study of 57 reorgs between 2000 and 2006 found that fewer than one-third produced any meaningful improvement in performance. Most had no effect, and some actually destroyed value.
...
We believe that this failure is rooted in a profound misunderstanding about the link between structure and performance. Contrary to popular belief, performance is not determined solely by the nature, scale, and disposition of resources, important though they may be. An army’s success depends at least as much on the quality of the decisions its officers and soldiers make and execute on the ground as it does on actual fighting power. A corporation’s structure, similarly, will produce better performance if and only if it improves the organization’s ability to make and execute key decisions better and faster than competitors. It may be that the strategic priority for your company is to become more innovative. In that case, the reorganization challenge is to structure the company so that its leaders can make decisions that produce more and better innovation over time.
...
The goals of the audit are to understand the set of decisions that are critical to the success of your company’s strategy and to determine the organizational level at which those decisions should be made and executed to create the most value. If you can align your organization’s structure with its decisions, then the structure will work better, and your company’s performance will improve."
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E se pusermos de lado o organigrama e as funções?
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E se nos concentrarmos nos processos que compõem o ser vivo, o sistema que é a organização?
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Recorrendo ao 'canvas' de Osterwalder, ao desenhar o modelo do negócio:
Em função dos clientes-alvo, da proposta de valor, e dos canais para chegar às prateleiras:

• Quais são as actividades-chave?
• Quais são os recursos-chave?
• Quem são os parceiros-chave?
  

Quais são os processos críticos e quais são os processos contexto?
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É nos processos críticos que são realizadas as actividades-chave e são tomadas as decisões que fazem a diferença.
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"Ultimately, a company's value is no more (and no less) than the sum of the decisions it makes and executes. Its assets, capabilities, and structure are useless unless executives and managers throughout the organization make the essential decisions and get those decisions right more often than not."
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Continua.

What to Do Against Disruptive Business Models?

Constantinos Markides e Daniel Oyon, no número de Verão deste ano da MIT Sloan Management Review apresentam um artigo muito interessante sobre trabalhar para diferentes clientes-alvo "What to Do Against Disruptive Business Models? (When and How to Play Two Games at Once)"

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O problema:

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"most companies are unsuccessful in their efforts to compete with two business models at once"

...

"By attempting to compete with themselves, Porter argued, companies risk paying a significant straddling cost: damaging their existing brands and diluting their organizations’ cultures for innovation and differentiation.
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His view was that a company could find itself “stuck in the middle” if it tried to compete with both low-cost and differentiation strategies."

...

A solução:

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"The primary solution proposed to solve this problem is to keep the two business models (and their underlying value chains) separate in two distinct organizations. That is the “innovator’s solution” that Clayton Christensen proposed and that has been supported by others"

...

"Although the idea of creating separate business units has received a lot of attention, this approach by itself does not ensure success."

...

"We have also found that competing successfully with two different and conflicting business models involves more than creating a separate unit. Several years ago, we studied the experiences of 68 companies that faced the challenge of competing with dual business models. Our main finding was that only a handful of companies that created separate units were successful in playing two games. Many had created separate units and still failed, suggesting that separation in itself was not enough to ensure success."

...

Mas não basta criar uma outra unidade...

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"we examined 42 companies that had created a separate unit to compete in the new market. Of these, 10 were successful, while 32 failed. We compared the two groups on three dimensions:

• (1) the amount of strategic, financial and operational autonomy given to the unit (measured on a scale of 1 to 5, with high scores implying that decision-making autonomy was granted to the unit)
• (2) differences in the culture, budgetary and investment policies, evaluation systems and rewards relative to the parent (measured on a scale of 1 to 6 with high scores implying that these policies were very different)
• (3) whether the new unit was managed by a new CEO and (4) whether the new CEO came from outside the company or was transferred internally.

We found that successful companies gave much more operational and financial autonomy to the separate units than unsuccessful companies. They also allowed the units to develop their own cultures and budgetary systems, and to have their own CEOs. These are all policies consistent with the notion that the new units need freedom to operate as they see fit. However, we also found that autonomy did not come at the expense of synergies: The parent still kept close watch over the strategy of the unit; cooperation between the unit and the parent was encouraged through common incentive and reward systems; and the CEO tended to be transferred from inside the organization to facilitate closer cooperation and active exploitation of synergies."

Os Gestores Supersticiosos

Em Julho de 1996 a revista MIT Sloan Management Review publicou o artigo "Are U.S. Managers Superstitious about Market Share?".

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"Does the strategy of linking market share to profit really work? This investigation argues that there is simply no causal relationship between market share and profits."

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Em linha com um dos meus ditados preferidos:

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Volume is Vanity, Profit is Sanity.

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"Many U.S. managers are superstitious as well, particularly about business strategy. The false notion that higher market share causes higher profits has had a huge impact on companies’ performance, the associated welfare of employees and shareholders, and society in general. Unfortunately, corporate goals and executive incentive systems are often partially based on market share achievements. Business journalists evaluate companies by describing them in terms of market share, with the clear implication that bigger is better. And, every semester, marketing and strategy textbooks lead business students astray."

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Como escreveu Hermann Simon, "Manage For Profit Not For Market Share"

Querem apostar?

"BTW, recordo as palavras de José Sócrates na última entrevista televisiva que deu. Disse qualquer coisa como "Poupança. Que horror! Dinheiro parado no banco" " (Recordar aqui)

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Progresso na mudança de modelo mental?

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"Atitude de poupança é a “melhor forma” de combater o endividamento externo"

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Ou será apenas mais um degrau para confiscar parte do salário dos portugueses e convertê-lo, obrigatoriamente, em Certificados do Tesouro?

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Querem apostar?

Em vez de apostar na guerrilha...

... podiam apostar na parceria.

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A Centromarca não aprende!!! Aonde levam os seus sócios com esta abordagem?

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"Fabricantes esclarecem que distribuição vai manter preços à custa dos fornecedores -- Centromarca"

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"Distribuição pressiona fornecedores a assumirem IVA"

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Basta recordar Centromarca ou a série "Agarrem-me senão eu mato-me!!!"

Time to shut down the US Federal Reserve?

"Time to shut down the US Federal Reserve?"

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"Actually, Greenspan never got a Phd. His honourary doctorate was awarded later for political reasons. (He had been a Nixon speech-writer). But never mind." LOL, I know what you mean, here we have Vieira da Silva.

Lugar do Senhor dos Perdões (parte V)

Continuado daqui: parte I, parte II, parte III e parte IV.

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Voltando ao livro "Job Creation and Destruction" de Steven Davis, John Haltiwanger e Scott Schuh:

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"Like most people, policymakers and bureaucrats evince a reluctance to acknowledge mistakes. Consequently, targeted policy programs tend to persist beyond the point of economic desirability, and they are likely to be managed in a way that obscures evidence of policy failure. (Moi ici: Qimonda, Aerosoles, ...) Once again, this political economy argument is not new, but it acquires added force in light of the dominant role of idiosyncratic determinants of business performance. To minimize job loss and business failure - thereby helping to preserve the image of a successful policy - the least successful businesses in targeted sectors often receive more generous subsidies or other forms of assistance."

Acerca do deboche...

"Stimulus alone will not work because the U.S. private sector needs a debt restructuring. Too much consumption has been pulled forward and financed by too much debt. The result a horrible misallocation of productive investment to which we are now awakening. That necessarily means lower economic growth and lower income growth going forward – a situation which makes many debt contracts of yesteryear uneconomic. Debtors are simply too indebted to take on more. (Moi ici: está cá tudo)

And should the Federal Government continue to socialize these losses as they have done, we can be sure that a disproportionate amount of real resources will continue to be devoted to buying and selling houses or concocting financial products to sell to one another. And then perhaps the day of reckoning can be put off. Is that going to make the U.S. grow again?
...
It is this lack of global aggregate demand (Moi ici: este é um ponto importante: ver aqui e aqui) – resulting from too much debt in parts of the global economy and not enough in others – that is the essence of the problem, which only economists with names beginning in R seem to understand (there is no R in PIMCO no matter how much I want to extend the metaphor, and yes, Paul _Rugman fits the description as well!)."

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Trechos retirados de "It’s the debt, stupid – Bill Gross edition"

Ainda mais uma vez: acerca da produtividade

Nem de propósito, ontem colocámos no blogue vários artigos sobre a produtividade, ao final do dia a McKinsey Quarterly publicava o artigo "The productivity imperative":

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"In the wealthy nations of the developed world, by contrast, low birthrates and graying workforces will make it enormously difficult to maintain what economist Adam Smith called “the natural progress of opulence.”
These countries’ best hope for keeping the wealth creation engine stoked is improved productivity—producing more with fewer workers. Paradoxically, doing that well across an economy is also the only way to generate lasting employment gains.
...
We call the productivity challenge an imperative because the need is so compelling. But to eke out even modest GDP increases, OECD1 nations must achieve nothing short of Herculean gains in productivity."

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Basta olhar para o exemplo japonês "Japan May Wither as Working Population Reaches 20-Year Low: Chart of Day"

“Numa empresa dele talvez”

Grande resposta de Belmiro de Azevedo, ao nível dos tempos áureos de Pinto da Costa:

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"O ministro da Economia, Vieira da Silva afirma que se as empresas estiverem em condições de absorver o impacto da subida do IVA em 1%, que amanhã entra em vigor, o devem fazer. Em resposta a esse apelo, o chairman da Sonae, Belmiro de Azevedo, não deixa margem para dúvidas. “Numa empresa dele talvez”, enfatizou.

Belmiro de Azevedo pensa que as empresas não devem suportar nova subida de impostos e justifica.”A Sonae paga rigorosamente, “on time”, os impostos devidos. Não deve pagar mais nem menos, deve pagar tudo. Não faz sentido o Estado andar a pedir esmola ou a fazer favores à custa dos empresários. Já há encargos fiscais enormes”, disse o chairman da Sonae, à margem da apresentação do novo edifico da empresa, o “Sonae Maia Business Center”, evento em que esteve também presente Vieira da Silva."

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Trecho retirado daqui.

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Por favor, alguém que lhe tire a venda que continua às apalpadelas.

.

Frases na sequência da sua tradição pessoal "Acham que a função de um Governo é estar a antecipar uma evolução negativa para a qual não tem ainda nenhum dado que o confirme? Se o estivesse a fazer, seria um profundo erro.""

Ainda acerca da Produtividade

"Redefining Manufacturing Productivity"
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"If the traditional definition of productivity is output per worker hour, most improvement efforts historically have been focused on the denominator in that equation: worker hours."
...
""Over the past 20 years, manufacturing plants were considered outside the domain of the business itself," says Peter Martin, vice president of strategic ventures at Invensys Process Systems. "Executives viewed plants as necessary evils, and they focused a lot of their productivity improvement activities on headcount reduction."

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In the 1970s and 1980s, the investments in new plant floor automation and control systems were most often justified by headcount reductions. Productivity-focused technology investments were calculated primarily to reduce labor costs rather than streamline or reengineer core processes.
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As a result, Martin says, "In the '70s and '80s, we saw huge reductions in the headcount of field and control room operators. In the '80s and '90s, the focus was on automating maintenance, and headcounts in maintenance departments plunged. And, in the '90s and 2000s," he says, "the focus has been on engineering.
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It's gotten to the point that many plants found themselves below the critical mass level in terms of headcount.
.

So the focus on reducing headcount as a way to generate productivity is over."
.

Now, Martin says, manufacturers must shift their focus from the headcount denominator part of the productivity equation to the numerator: making sure the plant is operating at maximum efficiency, that assets are generating the greatest possible return on investment, and that companies are agile enough to recognize shifts in demand and to respond to them quickly.
In order to do that, experts say, manufacturers must leave behind the notion that the plant is a necessary evil, divorced from the rest of the business. Plant-level processes and systems must be integrated with the processes and systems of the extended enterprise such as sales, fulfillment, and procurement, so that business managers and manufacturing operators alike have better, up-to-date visibility into not just how well a machine or production line is operating in isolation, but how well it is contributing overall to profitability, return on assets, and production goals.

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With that kind of integrated view, analysts say, the definition of productivity itself will change. Rather than finetuning operations so that they simply pump out the most widgets per hour, manufacturers will be able to optimize, for example, on profitability or the ability to respond quickly to changes in demand."

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Não é fácil encontrar esta linguagem que pregamos aqui no blogue.

Reflexões sobre a produtividade

"What determines productivity?"

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"When Bartelsman and Doms (2000) reviewed the state of knowledge in this area a decade ago, one of the most prominent and substantive findings were the enormous and persistent differences in measured productivity across producers, even within narrowly defined industries.

.
That some producers obtained twice as much output (or more) from the same measured inputs shaped research agendas over the past decade in a number of fields, including macroeconomics, industrial organisation, labour, organisational economics, and trade. Recent research efforts have been directed at trying to understand why these productivity differences exist and are so ubiquitous."

...

"The new findings offer two categories of explanations for inter-firm productivity differences.

• One includes factors that operate primarily within businesses, be it at the firm, plant, or even production line level. These are potentially under the control of management or other economic actors inside the firm.
• The second set contains elements external to the firm. The impact of these “environmental” factors might not always be direct, but they can affect producers’ willingness and ability to harness factors in the first set. They may also influence the amount of productivity dispersion that is sustainable in equilibrium."

IMHO, o factor mais importante, intra-sector, para explicar a disparidade na produtividade reside:

• "Managerial practice/talent

Managers are conductors of an input orchestra, coordinating the application of labour, capital, and intermediate inputs. Just as a poor conductor can lead to a cacophony rather than a symphony, poor management can lead to discordant production operations."

Os jogadores de bilhar amador...

só pensam na jogada imediata. 10 anos é muito, muito à frente.

.

"In the whole discussion about whether the U.S. should borrow more now when the interest rates are low, I miss one crucial thing - what happens when the debt comes due?
.
Risk-free debt is really risk-free only when the maturity also coincides with terminal repayment. "

.

Texto completo aqui.

Lugar do Senhor dos Perdões (parte IV)

Continuado daqui, daqui e daqui.

.

Voltando ao livro "Job Creation and Destruction" de Steven Davis, John Haltiwanger e Scott Schuh:

.

"First, the great heterogeneity of plant-level job growth and productivity outcomes suggests that businesses probably exhibit sharply different responses to policy interventions, even within narrowly defined industries or other sectoral groupings. Because businesses are not easily classifiable into sectors with homogeneous behavior, policies that grant preferential treatment to identifiable groups of firms can be poor tools for encouraging or discouraging particular economic activities. For example, when an industry successfully lobbies for import protection in the name of protecting jobs, some firms may not use the resulting increase in cash flow to preserve jobs."

...

"the large role played by idiosyncratic factors makes it more difficult to discern the impact of policy interventions on the performance of affected firms."

...

"the idiosyncratic determinants of business performance exacerbate the cost and difficulty of evaluating targeted commercial policies. As a consequence, useless or harmful targeted policies are more likely to persist over time before recognition of their inefficay sets in."

...

"Debates about targeted industrial policy often center on the government's capacity or lack of capacity to identify potential winners. (Moi ici: Pois, o Grande Planeador, o Grande Geometra que tudo sabe) In our view, an even more serious problem with targeted industrial policies involves the government's ability to respond appropriately to economic losers. By their nature, targeted policies engender political constituencies with a special interest in preserving the benefits of preferential tax, subsidy, or regulatory treatment. Once organized, these political constituencies continue to press for preferential treatment regardless of whether the targeted policy continues to promote greater economic efficiency. Thus, targeted policies encourage the formation of special interest groups that, in turn, undermine the application of economic efficiency criteria to future economic policy decisions. (Moi ici: Como diz o miúdo do filme "O Sexto Sentido", "All the time!!!" )

.

This line of argument is not new, but it acquires greater force from the evidence of heterogeneity in plant-level employment and productivity outcomes. The large magnitude of job creation and destruction, including the important role of births and deaths, suggests that trial and error play a central role in economic growth and in the evolution of businesses and industries. Put differently, large-scale business failure and job destruction are normal, probably essential, elements of a successful market economy. But targeted policies impede the trial-and-error process by inhibiting business failure and job destruction when such outcomes are economically desirable. ... Market mechanisms for dealing with economic failure are likely to operate more efficiently and expeditiously than political mechanisms."

.

Continua.

E se eles realmente resolverem sair?

"Maioria dos alemães é a favor do fim do euro"

.

"Maioria dos alemães quer o marco de volta"

Podiam ajudar e tirar a venda

"Vieira da Silva "preocupado" com impacto das dificuldades de financiamento da banca" na senda do marcador:

Nós também vamos precisar de um corte de cabelo

"Roubini says Greece needs orderly debt restructuring to avoid 'inevitable default'"

.

"He argues that orderly restructurings, such as in Pakistan in 1999 and Uruguay in 2002, "are better for most private creditors, the debtor nation and multilateral institutions thatn an Argentine-style botched bail-out"."

.

Vamos precisar e não vou ter pena de quem empresta droga a governos viciados.

Primeiro passo para iniciar a mudança

Acabar com as negações e biombos e enfrentar a realidade de frente...

.

Não consigo imaginar um político da Península Ibérica com esta linguagem:

.

"many people are under the “delusion” that just because the UK has historically been one of the richest countries on earth, it will always remain so.

.
Only if we “reboot and rebuild” the UK economy can the country’s future prosperity be assured, he said."

...

"“I think too many people in this country are living under the delusion that a prosperous past guarantees a prosperous future. But it isn’t written anywhere that this country deserves a place at the top table.."

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Por cá, ainda há dias, Mário Soares dizia que somos um país de futuro... por causa do nosso esforço e trabalho? Não, por causa da nossa história e localização geográfica.

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Que inveja...

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Trecho inicial retirado de "David Cameron: 'The world doesn't owe us a living'"

Somos todos alemães (parte VI)

Esta é uma afirmação antiga neste blogue, basta recordar "Somos todos alemães (parte V)"

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Sintomático que Merkel hoje a tenha repetido "«Princípios da economia alemã devem ser seguidos por todos»"

Está tudo relacionado

"Portugal entre os países onde o IVA mais subiu"
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"Sócrates é recordista europeu da subida dos impostos sobre trabalho"
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"O tira-teimas de 2011"
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"Sócrates discute crédito à economia com banqueiros"

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Tudo consequências naturais de uma espiral de degradação decorrente do estertor de uma economia socialista normanda.

Sensory branding (parte II)

Já escrevemos aqui sobre o conceito de sensory branding: aqui e aqui.

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Pois bem, "Sensory branding from Singapore Airlines"

O choque chinês num país de moeda forte (parte VI)

Em linha com o segundo gráfico deste postal "O choque chinês num país de moeda forte (parte II)" (o título é sintomático e premonitório), em linha com este postal sobre o emprego e a produtividade (especial atenção ao quadrante C):

Este interessante artigo "Downsizing in German Chemical Manufacturing Industry during the 1990s. Why Small is Beautiful?" lança mais algumas pistas de reflexão sobre o jogo do gato e do rato e sobre como o choque chinês é enfrentável num país de moeda forte.

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"The 1990s have brought about severe competitive challenges and new rules of playing game in chemical industry. Freeman (1999) claims that the last decade was accompanied by great changes, with the massive restructuring as the key feature:
The days of the integrated chemical company were coming to an end, with companies abandoning noncore business segments in efforts to boost the creation of shareholder value. The reshaping of the industry had begun in the 1980s, but it was on a small scale compared to that in the 1990s.

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The German chemical industry have been doing tremendous job (Landau and Arora, 1999) and continues to do so in development of the global and national economies in terms of employment, investments and value added as reported by the President of the Verband der Chemischen Industrie e.V. (Association of the German Chemical Industry). In past several years, the industry has been downsizing, “right sizing,” and producing new companies through small mergers, megamergers, and spin-offs. The new business reality gives every reason to believe there will be further consolidation and subsequent downsizing in the chemical industry (Millenium Special Report, 1999). This is also confirmed by the data for German chemical industry for 1992–2004 period, which tells us that the average size, defined as the number of employees of the firm, has decreased by about 47% (from 813 to 433).

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This seems counterintuitive to the general trend of merges and acquisitions (Weston et al., 1999), and to the literature, which documents that relatively larger firms have better propensity
to survive, and that economical/technological situation has put considerable pressure on smaller firms (Swift, 1999). Then the natural question arises: “Why small is beautiful?”

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The globalization has taken great pace during the 1990s and the “whales” of the traditional German manufacturing industries had to respond to changing environment in which production process could be transferred to nearby low-cost geographical locations. Audretsch and Elston (2006) claim that the dominant (largest) firms have reacted by substituting of technology and capital by labor as well as by locating the new plants outside Germany. In the chemical sector during 1991–1995 the domestic employment decreased by 80 thousands, while 14 thousands jobs were created by chemical firms outside Germany;

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"Baily et al. (1996) check the conventional faith that the rise in productivity and dowsizing are linked through some microeconomic mechanism.
Authors find, though, that both dowsizers and upsizers increase in productivity and the relationship is quite complex and not clearcut. In their other paper, Baily et al. (2001) try to resolve the debate on cyclical nature of the labor productivity over time. They claim that the productivity of long-term downsizers tends to be quite considerable, much larger than that of long-run upsizers." (Moi ici: A melhoria disruptiva é mais rentável que a melhoria incremental)

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These findings suggest that for German chemical manufacturing firms improving technical efficiency has not been the first priority during the 1990s. Instead, they have been paying special attention to establishment of an optimal scale, while technical efficiency has been supported on a certain level.
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Bathelt (2000) identifies three types of German chemical firms: (i) semiflexible integrated firms, mainly medium-large and large sized, with main features being high degree of vertical and/or horizontal integration and limited product and process flexibility; (ii) conventionally specialized firms, mostly small and medium sized, which are characterized by a low degree of product and process flexibility; and (iii) flexible specialized firms, which are mostly small and can only be found in the narrow chemical subindustry (pigments, dyes, paints, and varnishes). Except for the third type of firms, which tries to achieve economies of scope to adjust to market-segmentation tendencies, the first two care about economies of scale by various production activities and by producing relatively long-term homogeneous goods."

O jogo do gato e do rato (parte VI)

"Paul Krugman Explains The Unmistakable Link Between Inequality And Financial Crises"
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"His basic thesis: it's not an accident that the two "big ones" in American history have both occurred just as inequality reached extreme peaks."

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O que causa o aumento da desigualdade dos salários?

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A globalização!!!

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Basta recordar a parte V desta série.

Poupança alheia e paciência

"Primeiro, não se pode ancorar processos sustentáveis de crescimento em poupanças alheias, tipicamente volúveis. Segundo, não existem milagres instantâneos e indolores. O sucesso económico demora a conquistar-se, exigindo paciência, perseverança, consistência e constância."

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Trecho retirado de "Crescimento: a mãe de todas as soluções"