Business Strategy

You’ve heard the saying “fighting the last war.” It refers to competing using familiar techniques, against competitors you’ve faced before, in the same markets or industries, only to discover that the rules have changed.

Modern business competition is changing rapidly, and to compete effectively, you need to understand the skills that are required to win.

How often have you heard people say, “Our strategy is to become the biggest and the best?” This is not strategy. Strategy is not the what. Strategy is the how – how will you become the biggest and the best? Of course, within the realm of the definition, there are good strategies and bad ones. Good strategies help to define a company or a brand’s point of difference.

I recently attended a meeting of senior HR executives that was hosted by a large company headquartered outside of Boston. During the meeting, the company’s chief human resource officer shared her experience working with a new CEO who was focused on transforming the corporate culture. The company works in an industry that demands constant innovation, and the CEO is determined to enhance the organization’s capacity to innovate by reducing layers of management and making the company more nimble.

'Shark Tank' Presentation Opens IHRIM's 35th Annual Conference

In 2005, Fast Company wrote a scathing review of the HR profession in an article titled, “Why We Hate HR.”

Fast-forward ten years to 2015 and, according to the Harvard Business Review article “Why We Love to Hate HR…and What HR Can Do About It” by Peter Cappelli, everyone still hates HR.  

The article in Sunday’s New York Times describing Amazon’s relentless, hard-driving work environment is, in many ways, a case study in how one very large company is responding to our changing work world.

On June 17, @shrmnextchat chatted with Kevin Mottram (@KevyDMottram) and Alex Alonso (@shrmresearchVP) about "Can Holacracy Work at Work."

In case you missed this excellet chat on the Holacracy operating model, you can see all the great tweets here and below: 

It’s always interesting to hear how the people management profession differs worldwide. Workplace laws, business culture and social mores vary country by country. What works in one nation, industry or even company, may not work in another because when it comes to managing people—the most complex but critical aspect of business—there is no one-size-fits all approach.

Still, some keys to HR’s success are universal.