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- BNET Author Biography
Stuart Cross is a founder of Morgan Cross Consulting, which helps companies find new ways to drive substantial, profitable growth. His clients include Alliance Boots, Avon and PricewaterhouseCoopers.- more about Stuart Cross »
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- How Support Teams Safeguard Their Jobs
- Starbucks recently announced that 1,000 non-store jobs would be cut as part of its efforts to return the company to profit. It's unlikely to be the last business to cut costs in central overheads as the credit crisis affects company profits. We are...
- Blog posts 2008-09-01
- Are Big Goals a Burden to Business?
- The latest on the banking catastrophes and the debate about bonuses has got me thinking about goal-setting. Specifically, do highly ambitious and stretching goals that significantly raise the bar help or hinder organisational performance? The case for challenging goals ...
- Blog posts 2009-02-16
- Innovation: Less Strategy, More Action
- Customers are poor predictors of their own behaviour. Just ask Tesco. It spent a year talking to potential consumers on the US's west coast, trying to understand their needs and motivations, before launching its Fresh & Easy store concept a couple of years ago. ...
- Blog posts 2009-02-23
- Why Problem-Solving's Not Enough
- How much time do you devote to solving problems, and how much to stopping them from happening again? Managers are rewarded for their ability to solve problem. Most enjoy identifying why mistakes have happened and working out how to best resolve them. ...
- Blog posts 2009-03-03
- The Decisions You Shouldn't Rush
- There are two types of decisions. The first type can be called 'everyday decisions'. They rely on a manager's experience and expertise and account for the majority of decisions made each day. The second type can be called 'one-off decisions'. These are decisions...
- Blog posts 2009-03-09
- Are You Agile Enough for an Upturn?
- The world is changing and will never be the same again. Incremental tweaks to your business are unlikely to create long-term gains. Instead, organisations must combine shorter-term profit protection with more fundamental changes to their strategy and the way they operate. There...
- Blog posts 2009-03-24
- The Top Five Innovation Killers
- Innovation has never been more important to companies as it is now. The recession is creating new needs and new forms of value are needed to fulfill them. Yet there remains a yawning gulf between business leaders' rhetoric on innovation and the reality...
- Blog posts 2009-03-30
- The Debt You Don't Mind Paying
- I played my first ever gig on Friday night. A lifetime's ambition was fulfilled when I slung on my guitar and played a six-song set with a group of relative strangers. Colin, the owner of Guitar Base, a Nottingham guitar shop, had brought...
- Blog posts 2009-04-09
- Head vs. Heart: Which Drives Your Decisions?
- Despite what we may choose to tell ourselves, many of our major decisions are emotional, not rational. They play to our ego and sense of self worth, or are driven by a desire to follow others. For example, I bought a new HD...
- Blog posts 2009-04-22
- 5 Ways to Keep Long-Term Goals Alive
- In turbulent times, there's a danger that longer-term objectives go out the window. Many of the business leaders I work with find it relatively easy to identify and develop strategic visions for their company. For them, the difficulty comes in translating these ambitions into immediate results....
- Blog posts 2009-05-12
- Don't Panic! You Earned that Promotion
- "The Peter Principle" suggests that managers get promoted to their own level of incompetence. I propose an alternative view: that managers are promoted to their own level of insecurity. Let me explain. Last week, my football team, Preston North End, lost to Sheffield...
- Blog posts 2009-05-19
- Why Executives Try to Do Too Much
- The biggest flaws I see in most executive teams is their desire to do too much. In the current economic climate the temptation to add a few more projects to the agenda, in a bid to offset declining sales and profits, is understandable but mistaken. Too many...
- Blog posts 2009-06-02
- Time for a Meeting Revolution: All Those in Favour?
- Research published today by IT company Parity found UK business professionals spend the equivalent of eight weeks a year in face-to-face meetings. This is compounded by a lot of other research from Canada to New Zealand that comes to the same conclusion: unnecessary...
- Blog posts 2009-06-09
- Why Collaboration is so Difficult
- Effective collaboration is to business performance what inaugural speeches are to the effectiveness of governments and presidents. Although both may promise big prizes, they are quickly overtaken by current realities, entrenched stakeholder positions and inadequate operational capabilities. For every Lincoln, there are likely to be many Carters, Bushes and Clintons....
- Blog posts 2009-06-16
- Don't Take the No-Risk, No-Growth Option
- Avoiding risk is the most effective way to make your business irrelevant, redundant and bankrupt. Unfortunately, it appears that, in the face of the recession, risk avoidance has become the preferred strategy of most British companies. Last week, the insurer RSA and the Future...
- Blog posts 2009-06-23
- When Managers Should Act Like Rock Stars
- I went to see Keane play in Nottingham at the weekend. I'm not a lifelong fan of the band but, as the evening went along, I found myself on my feet clapping, dancing and singing along. It was not simply that the group has excellent musicians...
- Blog posts 2009-02-03
- Why the Profit Motive Corrupts Corporate Culture
- You don't always achieve your goals by focusing on them directly. Sometimes a more indirect route is required to achieve success. Last week I was working in the US and watched President Obama's inauguration with some American friends and colleagues. Obama didn't focus on economic statistics and...
- Blog posts 2009-01-28
- What Darwin Can Teach Business Leaders
- Â This year marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his seminal work, "On The Origin Of The Species". His theory is now associated with business through the concept of "Darwinian Economics" -- which claims that...
- Blog posts 2009-01-14
- Tesco's Real Strategy Secret
- Â Sterling Performance's post on Tesco explains how the supermarket made the Balanced Scorecard central to its success. Yet I think it missed out a vital ingredient that I do not see in many other organisations. Persistence. Tesco has not been using the Balanced...
- Blog posts 2008-09-08
- The Five C's of Leading in Adversity
- The crucible of great leadership is adversity. Many of the UK's iconic figures -- Nelson, Churchill, Shackleton -- built their reputations by leading others through seemingly intractable situations. Most businesses now face a period of high uncertainty and difficulty and your own leadership...
- Blog posts 2008-09-23
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