If you wrote the draft e-mail below, would you be bold enough to hit “Send”?

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

To: CEO

From: A low-level employee

Subject: Why are we under-performing?

Date: August 1, 20XX

Dear CEO:

I realize that as an employee several layers down in our organization, I risk a career-limiting move by e-mailing you. But I will take the risk to share with you my concerns about our organization’s poor performance.

I am not alone but feel disconnected

During hallway and cafeteria conversations with co-workers at my level, I detect low morale and a collective feeling of malaise. Employees are asking, “Where are we going? Why are we poorly performing?”

Initially, some managers answered by pointing their finger at you as whom to blame. They say, “Weak leadership. No vision. Not a motivator.” more

Do the words, “pop quiz,” stimulate shivers down your spine and send you into a cold sweat? Do you remember when your school teacher would say, “Put your books aside, we are having a pop quiz”?

Rest easy, this pop quiz won’t be too difficult. Even better, it is multiple choice, so you can guess and maybe luck out. The answers are at the bottom.

Question 1. Which has relatively higher value for managing an organization’s strategy?

a. A balanced scorecard

b. A strategy map

c. A club to whack underperforming managers

more

This Friday is the big day – England’s royal wedding of William, Prince of Wales, and Kate Middleton in Westminster Abbey. Some readers are already experiencing wedding hype fatigue while others just cannot get enough of it. The existence of a royal family is always a curiosity of countries, like the USA, that do not have one. In the USA, the President and first lady are the default king and queen. Political pundits often write about the benefits of having royalty. One benefit is it allows the politicians in a nation’s government to focus on governing while the royalty can handle the tea-and-crumpet social aspects of its citizens.

What if companies had their own king and queen along side the CEO, COO, CFO, and all the other vice-presidents of the executive team? more

The information technology analyst firm Forrester Research recently published a report that described the gap between data governance and business process management (titled Avoid Process Data Headaches: Align Business Process and Data Governance Initiatives, it’s available here; see also this InformationWeek article). Forrester sees a wide disconnect between data quality and process improvement initiatives, exposing both efforts to the risk of potential failure.

This stimulated me to think more deeply about the data quality issue for enterprise performance management. more

I keep coming across evidence that there are still serious misunderstandings about the potential scope and power of performance management initiatives.

Here’s an example: blogger Ann All recently posted this article titled “BPM + CRM = Improved (not Perfect) Customer Service.” In it, she advocates integrating a company’s customer relationship management (CRM) system with business process management (BPM) tools.

The article is a solid piece. However, when it comes to integration, why stop with just those two components? Why limit what information and solutions can be combined and integrated?

One reason for this myopia is because there’s still some confusion in the marketplace about the meaning of the term “performance management.” Just Google it and you’ll see what I mean. more