Manage for Results

After working intimately with clients and with regulations, we then encourage idea sharing among our managers and formalize this learning annually in our planning. Every two years , we complete a significant long-range planning process. We start by thinking outside of the box in which we have historically positioned ourselves , as competitors also will have.

As a more routine matter, capturing what we call Key Indicators of business performancewhich go beyond merely financial variables is important. We have trained departmental managers to use computerized systems to track operating parameters such as time to initiation, time to completion, and percentage utilization of key capacities . These are Key Indicators that these managers or their predecessors selected initially. They were designed to make sense to operating managers and to be useful tools for them, more than for senior managers or financial analysts. They have greatly augmented our original accounting-based P&L and capital asset management systems, spreading well-developed tool sets into broader use.

There are various functional positions that contribute to these processes. As a team, each group has the different functional capabilities and perspectives of experience needed to plan and manage the business unit. Most importantly, our directors of sales are members of the operating profit teams for each division, although these report functionally to our worldwide Vice President of Sales and Marketing. Financial analysts are also closely associated with the operating teams . Among other contributions, these experts develop tools for operating managers to use and help train new managers in using them.