One of the most critical capabilities we see in markets today is the ability to innovate. Innovation can occur in multiple areas including products, services, distribution, administrative systems, strategy, etc. But what is the discipline of innovation and how can you, as an HR manager, bring it to a company?
Dave Ulrich introduces an innovation protocol - a framework that HR professionals can bring to management teams to drive a disciplined discussion about building innovation as a capability.
All companies must understand and respond to the needs of their customers if they are to be successful. HR professionals are ideally positioned to build that capability by bringing customer information into the firm, disseminating that information throughout the firm, and using that information as the basis for integrating and coordinating the activities of their organization.
In this video, Wayne Brockbank describes the role of HR in developing a "Customer Connectivity" capability within the organization and provides examples of HR organizations that have achieved success in this area.
Organizations merge, make acquisitions, or simply reorganize in an effort to make the whole better than the sum of the individual parts. In organizations, we refer to this capability as "collaboration." Companies that succeed over time learn to collaborate well.
In this video Dave Ulrich discusses the two parts of the collaboration capability: Managing for Efficiency and Managing for Leverage.
As we talk to senior business leaders, one thing we find in common is that most leaders wish they had more alignment in their organization. Alignment means having all people, systems, and processes taking the organization in the same direction. When alignment occurs, we say that an organization has the organizational capability of "Strategic Unity."
In this video, Mark Nyman discusses the first half of the Strategic Unity capability - the clarification of the corporate organization strategy. He describes how to answer questions like: "How many businesses do we have" - "What are the relationships between those businesses" - "What is the role between the corporate office and individual business units?"
Our research shows that companies with "Learning" as a capability had much higher business performance, not because they were right the first time, but because they were right over time. When you can generate new ideas and generalize those ideas across boundaries, you impact the performance of the organization and deliver sustainable value. In this video segment, Dave Ulrich talks about how to build learning as a capability in your organization.
Accountability means that high performance counts. Accountability becomes an organizational capability when it becomes ingrained in the culture. In this video, Norm Smallwood explains the four requirements that create an accountable organization: Clear Goals, Measures, Consequences, and Feedback. He highlights common weaknesses in the system and important areas to focus efforts in order to build accountability as a capability in your organization.