corporate – My thinking

Introduction

This topic is shared by Mr.Andreas Raharso. He currently works as Dean of Hay Group Global Research Center for Strategy Execution on International Indonesian Scholar Association Seminars. The purpose of his presentation is to emphasize that researcher is an important component in Indonesia current industrial environment.

Commodization trap

Nearly all brand in our modern era start to diversify. McDonald starts to sell nice coffee while Starbucks starts to sell nice sandwich. Brands easily diversify to chase what other people chase and lose their own identity. That’s what commodization trap meant.

Scientist can free industry from this trap by give new insight. Scientist can give industry a new value to chase unexplored area.

Research is important

Gillette, once target India market as the expected market size is big. They conduct consumer behavior research on Indian people who live in America. The result, the product fails marketed in India. After bought by PnG, they do another research. Now, the researcher team flies to India to do rigor market research. For information, PnG also supported by 8000 scientists, 1000 doctor, 123 science discipline, spread over 72 countries. The result, now the Gillette product makes a big success in India.

Research is important in Industry to give value on product in industry, more important, to ensure industry sustainability. The question is simple, how we do it? Mr.Andreas emphasizes that big corporation like Unilever, GE, and IBM give a great attention to research division. The research division leader can report directly to CEO to determine method to increase company value.

Just read some HBR blog these days. And, concluded that the writers think that a leader must saw the corporate employees as web of trust. We can lead well if our company had a culture of trust[1]. It is an important foundation of effective and efficient human operation.

So, for managerial people, how can we build trust ? It’s kinda tricky though. But, other writer suggested several point need to be considered [2] :

You’re more likely to hear what people think and feel, if you’ve established real, ongoing human connections with them.
You’re more likely to hear people’s real thoughts and feelings once you’ve established a history of reacting calmly and constructively to comments of all kinds, even when they’re personal and not positive.
Seek out people’s perceptions and perspectives in the context of a specific task, project, or program.
Build a developmental network of people who will give you candid feedback
Finally, if she’s willing, your boss can also be a valuable source of feedback based on her own experience with you, and she can pass on what she hears about you from others

Of course those are only point to consider. But there’s another approach that’s more concrete. The writer call it “Kitchen Table Test” [3]. The writer write this about this approach “At breakfast with his family on Saturday mornings, he asks himself, How easy is it to explain what I have accomplished this week and the decisions I have made? Does my family get it? Does what I say make them proud? Does it make me proud to tell them about it?”. A simple, yet effective method indeed.

Simple, yet interesting view point. Thanks to HBR to share it =) And may you guys can had something from this lessons

Reference :

[1] Does Your Company Have a Culture of Trust?

http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/09/does_your_company_have_a_cultu.html

[2] Seeing Yourself as Others See You

http://blogs.hbr.org/hill-lineback/2011/09/to-see-yourself-as-others-see.html

[3] Passing the Kitchen Table Test

http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/09/passing_the_kitchen_table_test.html

Tag: corporate

[StudentsxCEOs] Science in Corporate World (Mr.Andreas Raharso)

Introduction

Commodization trap

Research is important

Conclusion

The leader corporate culture – Lesson learned from HBR