The democratisation of information
Posted by Grant Brewer
In any competitive marketplace, organisations need to balance agility with reliability. Much has been written about the need to create competitive advantage out of the ability to adapt to change – a capability often described as agility. Agility goes hand in hand in concepts such as self-organising teams, flat organisational structures and radical innovation. The common understanding is that organisations able to take advantage of the future as it unfolds before them will be able to reach customers first, building brand strength and market share ahead of their competitors. However, there is an almost equal amount of management literature dealing with the need for organisations to perform reliably; based on the idea that raising quality will result in meeting or exceeding the promises made to the marketplace. Six Sigma quality initiatives are all about removing variation from business processes, and are aimed at creating sustainable competitive advantage based on product or service quality.
This strategic balancing act requires constant decisions, not only from senior management but in different ways from all employees. For example, many meetings are held to reach agreement on decisions that involve (even if almost subconsciously) weighing up whether to head in a new direction, or whether to get better at what is already being done.
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