Editor’s letter

Citation

Randall, R.M. (2013), "Editor’s letter", Strategy & Leadership, Vol. 41 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/sl.2013.26141caa.001

Editor’s letter

Article Type: Editor’s letter From: Strategy & Leadership, Volume 41, Issue 3

The articles in this issue are ambitious in scope. They offer answers to big questions:

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  What decision rules drive the performance of exceptional companies?

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  What is the secret of leadership effectiveness?

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  How can social business create valued customer experiences, increase workforce productivity and effectiveness and accelerate innovation?

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  What’s the remedy for flawed offshoring decisions by the C-suite that have been causing US industry to waste away for decades?

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  What can executives learn about supply-chain risk from the Boeing 787 Dreamliner grounding that can prevent future mismanagement?

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  How can scenario planning be the centerpiece of a continuous learning program?

I’ll let the authors introduce their findings in their own words.

Three proven rules: discovering how exceptional companies think

Michael E. Raynor and Mumtaz Ahmed: “What is the secret of long-term exceptional corporate performance? There have been many attempts to answer this question, but satisfying prescriptions remain elusive … With this history in mind, our search for the keys to exceptionalism began with a radical premise: that what constitutes stand-out performance is not obvious.”

Masterclass - Effectiveness at the top – what makes the difference and why?

Brian Leavy: “Our starting point for entering into the fray is the question of why so many successful executives fail when they get to the highest level … So is the top job definably different from other executive positions? Are there particular qualities needed for success at this level? How much does context and timing matter?”

Social business: an opportunity to transform work and create value

Peter J. Korsten, Eric Lesser and James W. Cortada: “Social business can create valued customer experiences, increase workforce productivity and effectiveness and accelerate innovation … Companies at the forefront are embedding their external social tools into core business processes and capabilities. They are using social approaches not only to communicate better with their customers, but also to share knowledge with their suppliers, business partners and, perhaps most important, their employees.”

Boeing’s offshoring woes: seven lessons every CEO must learn

Stephen Denning: “In late 2012, Boeing’s new 787 Dreamliner was causing nightmares … The grounding [in 2013] was just the latest bad news for Boeing … Some of Boeing’s problems … are also symptoms of a deeper calamity that has been causing US industry to waste away for decades: flawed offshoring decisions by the C-suite.”

Case - What went wrong at Boeing

Stephen Denning: “What we do know now is that the way that Boeing went about outsourcing, both in the US and beyond, did not eliminate the dramatic cost increases and unanticipated technology problems that have already materialized … ‘Without the requisite skills to manage an unconventional supply chain, Boeing was undertaking a huge managerial risk in uncharted waters.’”

A continuous-learning process that updates and enhances planning scenarios

Gerald Harris: “After participating in a scenario analysis and developing strategies designed to be successful in several distinctly different futures, managers become more sensitized to potential shifts in their current markets and are better prepared to respond as the future unfolds … During the period after the scenarios have been sketched out but before the company leadership reaches the strategy-development or investment-decision stage, a continuous learning process can help planners and senior decision-makers identify and track the unfolding events that are most relevant to the challenges and big issues facing their organization.”

Good reading!

Robert M. RandallEditor-in Chief