Memorial Day also represents the unofficial start of summer.  Technically summer does not start until June 21^st and June 30^th represents the 181^st day of the calendar year.  But for all practical purposes 2010 is just about finished leaving little room to create and deliver new solutions and strategies that are not already in your plans.

Memorial Day represents the logical 2/3rds mark for enterprises and the potential of their actions in 2010 to have an impact on this year’s results.  The reasons behind this are simple.

U.S. companies have just finished the longest unbroken string of workdays 74 straight between Memorial day and President’s Day, the prior Federal Holiday in Mid February.  This was the ‘home stretch’ when everyone was expected to be working.  That time is gone.

The summer work schedule is fragmented with national holidays occurring every 22 days until Labor Day in September.  That coupled with the summer vacation season creates scheduling and mobilization schedules as not everyone you need may be available when you need them.

In Europe the summer holidays are often accompanied by extended vacations reducing productivity and creating resource-scheduling challenges

South of the equator, many enterprises close their books on June 30^th – the end of their fiscal year.  This means that they are well into their fourth quarter operations, wrapping up projects and preparing to execute FY 2011 initiatives.

The close of the second quarter of the fiscal year occurs at the end of June, this will mean another round of budget and financial forecasts and potentially budget cuts to shore up the third quarter and year end earnings.

The window for completing that will have a positive impact on FY 2010 results is fast closing.  Just assume that you need three months of productive experience to prove that solutions are working and take away a month for closing the fiscal year.

September 17th 2010

Is the last logical day to release new solutions

That is 76 workdays from June 1^st.  Not including taking one day for: The 4^th of July and Labor Day.  During that time only June (22) and August (22) will be months without a public holiday, but with summer vacations.  A two-week vacation during either of these two months effectively cuts the available days in half.

CIOs and IT executives facing up to this reality have a few options.

1)   Solidify the projects you have deployed before Memorial Day.  Concentrate on their deployment and benefits realization, as those are the solutions that will deliver the lion’s share of results for FY 2010.

2)   Focus resources on completing projects during the June time period when many families still have children in school.  Any project you can potentially finish in the next 20 working days should be a top priority.

3)   Come clean on projects that will either not start or finish before the last logical day – September 17^th.  If the project is not going to have a positive impact on 2010, then you have to think about the value of doing it at all.

4)   Consider sacrificing these projects, the ones that either have not started or will not finish in time, if you need to cut investment dollars as part of forecasting for the last half of the year.

5)   Start the IT strategic planning process NOW.  2011 plans and high level targets are already starting to form and now is the time to set expectations and identify projects that you will complete in 2010 but that will not generate value until 2011.

6)   Get your vacation in the calendar now and take it.  Delaying vacation until things are going good will mean delaying it for the rest of the year.  There is never a great time to be out of the office but you, your family and friends need you to take a break.

Memorial Day is a time to remember the sacrifices others have made and continue to make for everyone in the U.S.  It is also a time to step back and reflect how far we have come through difficult times in 2010 and recognize the time we have left this year to make our own difference.

I hope all of you in the U.S. have had an enjoyable and meaningful holiday.  For everyone, best wishes for the summer and success for the remainder of 2010.  Have a fun and safe summer.

The technology stack at an industry wide level can be described as consisting of four layers.  The layers, shown in the figure below, denote the different structures with different types of investment and classes of technology involved.  Change the nature of any one of these structures and you change the nature and value of IT.

The various structures in the technology stack are not new.  The figure above seeks to provide a simplified model based on a long running conversation I have had with Peter Keen about the shifting fundamentals of business technology.  The simplification of the levels and any errors are entirely mine alone.  The technology stack can be thought of as a series of structures, moving from bottom to top they include:

The Substructure comprises the physical communications and connectivity technologies required for computing.  The Internet is the ultimate substructure.  Substructure is hidden and in fact you do not realize it exists until it is compromised, for example when someone severs the cable that delivers your TV and Internet Service.

The Infrastructure covers the computing, communications, systems software, hardware and other elements running on the substructure.  This layer constitutes what we traditionally think of as IT infrastructure in includes the data centers, servers, storage, etc.

The Structure contains the business logic that you use to run your company.  These are the applications, the information / intelligence, the user interface, etc.  Structure is the way you run your business.  Structure runs on infrastructure to isolate complexity and provide scale.

Context is the ‘structure’ that creates value and meaning to your operations.  Context is what makes you unique in terms of your economic model, context, enterprise strategy, customers/markets, etc.  Context is the ‘ghost in the machine’ that brings the rest of the stack to life.

Using this simple model, we can see that over the last 40 years, technology structures have gone public – by that I mean they have moved from being services the company had to provide for itself to services that could be purchased on the market.  The figure below provides an illustrative example and some rough timing about the transition of the technology stack private to public hands.

So what?

It is interesting to note that these transitions were made in response to market forces and the nature of technology innovation that created new price performance ratios.  In many ways, the move from private to public has been a major force behind realizing scale efficiencies and the value of Moore’s law.  After all without the ability to share across enterprises, there would be little in terms of scale efficiencies and connectivity.

Transitions at the substructure and infrastructure levels are well underway and they have been shaping IT since Gartner introduced the IS-Lite Model in 1999.  The migration of infrastructure, via technology outsourcing, managed services and the cloud, is changing the nature of IT organizations, economics, and its value proposition.

When each structure goes from private to public it changes its value, capacity, capability and the structure of IT itself.  We can expect further changes in IT as structure goes public, through things like Web 2.0, software as a service and other consumer based technologies.  These forces will change the relevance of our application and data structures and their ability to deliver competitive advantage.

Context will change and some technologies that support context will shift into deeper structures, but it will never go public.  Context cannot by definition go public and have a viable and competitive enterprise.  In this regard, context is not the strategy, but the source of value that makes the strategy relevant to customers, competitors and investors.

CIOs need to recognize the changing forces created by shifts in the technology structure as they have deep and lasting implications for IT.  The impact of each of these shifts on the value of the technology, the IT organization, and the business views of IT will be covered in the next few posts.

Technology goes public changing the IT organization

Technology goes public changing IT value

The Leadership Forum breaks these choices and demands into three time periods that are the focus of the event’s interactive workshops.

Delivery results now! – What are the issues facing CIOs and the decisions the need to make for success in 2010?  It’s the close of the first quarter and enterprises have about six months to make a significant impact in this year.

Prepare for the upturn – How will you position your enterprise for success as the economy transitions from recession into recovery and growth?  Recovery follows every recession and the decisions/positions you take now determine your role in the recovery.

Navigating the next opportunities and threats – Where the future sources of value and challenges to your enterprise?  If part of the future is already here, then how do you see and understand the trends that will set the bar for the future.

Executives face a future with no clear single direction.  Economic, strategic and technology transitions will have a specific impact on your organization, its plans, capabilities and success.  CIOs in particular face a unique challenge, that of CHOICE as new lightweight delivery models and technologies give enterprises more options in creating and provisioning technology capability and capacity.

Choice can be thought of as a framework for thinking through the leadership issues we face today, in the recovery and in the future.

Cost – remains a focus as executives look to match every enterprise resource with changing revenue levels.  This is particularly important in IT where the average budget underwent multiple cuts in 2009 and resources remain tight in 2010.

Health – of the IT organization defined in terms of your confidence in IT skills and processes in light of the current balance of resources, responsibilities and results.  The majority of CIOs report that they do not have the right skills in their current organization.

Operations – the ability of IT to provide the capacity and services levels required by the enterprise.  This is a concern, as many CIOs do not have confidence in their ability to deliver results against their top business priorities and CIO strategies.

Innovation – Practical innovation at a premium to raise performance and create opportunities.  While CIOs feel that currently IT is delivering innovation, they all see the need to innovate in the way the enterprise uses information, business process and new classes of lightweight technologies like the social media creating by Web 2.0.

Capability – IT has been focused on managing resources and processes to enable the business.  However an early majority of CIOs (42%) already see IT as having a direct contribution and responsibility for raising business performance.

Execution – is where plans meet practicalities and create value. The current state of IT is fine for now, but 50% of CIOs believe IT will need to change in the future.

The table below combines the choices CIOs face across the three time periods that organize the CIO Leadership Forum.  It is offered as a tool for every CIO and IT executive to think through how they will deliver results today, prepare for the future and realize the potential of information and technology in the future.

Welcome to the CIOs in Phoenix and we all look forward to meeting the CIOs planning to attend in London.

This post concentrates on how IT raises productivity, a question provided in the comments to

IT has a central role in raising productivity because it is a source of leverage for information, communications, collaboration and management.  In other words, IT resources are available and for the most part are not consumed or used up in the execution of business activities.  That means I can readily flow more activity over the same resource base and therefore drive more productivity.

Economists will tell you that there are many ways to measure productivity.  There is output per work hour, capital, invested capital, assets etc.  For our purposes we will just use a simple idea that it is output per resource.  That will allow us to play a little fast and loose with the examples so they can be clearer.

Here are ways in which enterprises can use IT resources and capabilities to improve productivity:

• IT can automate processes and activities shifting those activities from resource constrained people to less constrained and higher capacity systems.  Much of the internal automation of HR and other administrative processes are examples.
• IT can shift work from internal to external resources such as customers, suppliers and other interested parties.  Such a move raises productivity particularly when those external resources have the information and motivation to perform those tasks better than your people.
• IT can accelerate cycle time for internal processes by improving coordination and workflow.  Shorter cycle time means that more work units can flow across the teams
• IT can raise the quality and availability of external products and services as well as internal operations.  Here information combined with preventative maintenance and continuous improvement locks in gains.
• IT can expand trading/operational hours and access without requiring additional resources.  Online stores, customer help facilities and other services provided over IT are examples.
• IT can raise the value of products and services with minimal increase in the cost of providing those products and services.  Information is the key, particularly when applied to offer personalized or differentiated service.

These are some overall ways in which IT can raise productivity.

Please provide your own examples and thoughts, as I am sure this just touches the surface.

Given the range of options I would like to suggest focusing on one thing – Cycle time.  Reducing cycle time not only raises productivity by increasing throughput, but in doing so it raises the quality of the results (fewer errors) and the customer satisfaction (prompt & responsive)

While the argument is an old one, the basic assumption for more than 30 years as the business and IT needed each other and therefore they would find a way to make it work.

At the WTN Fusion conference in Madison Wisconsin I challenged that assumption and tried to point out that today more than ever the business could in fact divorce IT, throw it out of the enterprise, and live fairly well as a single company constantly seeking technology based services.

It is important to put this argument in context.  First, I fully recognize that divorce is a significant, painful and regrettable situation.  This discussion does not make light of the pain, complexity and life altering change that comes about in the dissolution of a marriage or another committed relationship.

So lets define what we mean by the business divorcing itself from IT.

A business divorces itself from the IT organization when they provision technology and solutions through delivery models not built around your core IT organization. The IT function is not eliminated in a divorce, but their role is dramatically reduced much like the spouse who gets visitation rights.

Business executives consider a divorce when they find that there are irreconcilable differences based on the gap between expectations and reality are so great that the enterprise no longer needs to have the function as part of its operation.

Historically, executives did not have divorce as an option as the captive IT organization was the only source of technology.  This led enterprises to invest in ‘turning around IT’ in order to make up for past under investment or neglect.  Please note that the link requires a registration.

Divorce is a recent option for business as for years they were dependent on their captive IT organization to provide enterprise technology.  Sure there were other sources of IT services – service bureaus, etc.  but they were not a viable alternative for the range of technology services a modern organization had to build.

Business has more choice in provisioning technology than they have every had before either via the cloud, software as a service, public Internet and an expanding market of consumer applications.  While you can criticize the viability of these choices today, there can be no doubt that technology providers are investing in creating more choices for businesses gaining access for technology

Why does this matter to CIOs?

Well first the business is open to considering other options beyond the captive IT organization.  There is an appetite for an alternative delivery models, particularly when you consider the speed and energy executives took up the IT doesn’t matter arguments a few years ago.

Second many organizations are already separating themselves from IT.  Look at the use of services provisioned via the web, consumer technologies and end user developed applications.

Third you may already be signaling to the business that IT is losing interest in them when they outsource critical functions like application development and business facing activities to others.

So how do you avoid divorce?

Simple, if the irreconcilable differences based on gaps between business expectations and what IT delivers.  Recognize that IT processes and practices have to change as the business leaders expectations change from managing cost to creating results.

This starts with changing IT management practices from managing activities and proving that you are not wasting the company’s resources to managing for results and driving performance at speed and scale.

Here are some posts about that topic:

• Connecting activities with results on a single piece of paper

• A few ways CIOs and IT executives make it easier to separate business from IT

• Its easier for IT to value activities over results

• An alternative way to define IT project results

May you live long, prosper and happily ever after.

It is a year of transition according to CIOs who still see 2010 as a tight year for their enterprise and IT organization.  This is according to the 2010 CIO agenda based on the insights of more than 1,600 CIOs and summarized in the CIO agenda report and summary blog post (link).

Transition creates change and opportunities.  These opportunities threaten the status quo and challenge the enterprises ability to respond.  In 2010 the transition will be uneven impacting different global industries and local geographies making how you handle these transitions very personal and specific to your situation.  The transitions facing CIOs in 2010 include:

• Economic transition from recession to recovery
• Strategic transition from focusing on cost cutting efficiency to raising productivity
• Technology in transition from heavy weight to lighter technologies

Additional information thoughts on each of these transitions can be found by following the links about.

How you respond to these transitions, the changes you make to your organization, its metrics and measures, its relationships and priorities will determine your success in 2010.  It will also define the position and expectations of IT for the next five years.

That is a pretty bold statement.  Here is why I think it is accurate.

• First off, much of the work traditional IT has been completed.  We have automation, integrated and driving information across the enterprise.  Future value will not come by repeating that recipe opening the door for CIOs to reposition IT in terms of these transitions.
• Second, the business demands for IT solutions will respond to demands for new solutions that drive growth in the recovery and productivity improvements.  These demands fit IT’s ability to raise business performance better than demands for cost cutting.  CIOs who recognize this opportunity to apply IT in more innovative ways that create new reasons for customers to choose your company and new ways to deliver that value with greater effectiveness.
• Lightweight technologies will change the performance curve of information technology.  Lightweight technologies create solutions based on scalable services available via the Internet.  The move to lighter weight technologies will reward IT organizations that are responsive in terms of cycle time, cost and capacity.

Leading organization are already making these and other moves to lead in times of transition, changing IT at the same time as the enterprise is changing itself.  A significant early majority of CIOs already view IT as being directly responsible for changes in business performance, signifying that they know the rules of the game have changed.

What does that mean for your enterprise and your responsibilities in IT?   Well it means several things.

• Start managing results before managing resources.  The business lives on results and it is no longer sufficient to say you are doing a good job because you can prove that you are not wasting the company’s money.
• Consider changing the nature and structure of the IT organization to give it a lean performance orientation.  (more on that latter)
• Recognize and build the skills you will need for tomorrow and back fill what you don’t have with managed services.

Embrace the transition for what it is.  A chance to change and shed expectations that are no longer valid and define new ones that fit a greater focus on recovery, productivity and the leverage created by lighter weight technologies.

The time to think about and position these transitions is now as we complete the first quarter because before you know it summer will be upon us, the year will be more than half done and we will face another planning cycle.  Better set the stage now than scramble to update strategies and plans based on yesterdays rules.

The business rational for productivity is clear.  During the recession organizations tried to cut costs faster than revenues declined.  Many were successful preserving earnings in the downturn following this strategy.  This strategy placed IT a heart of reducing unit costs and resource levels to better match revenues.

Cost cutting concentrates on the denominator of the performance  eq1uation, see below.  Productivity is the opposite focusing on how to create more value by doing new things and increasing the value of existing practices.

However, as the economy turns up executives have demonstrate an ability to lock in those efficiency gains by changing the productivity of the enterprise.  If they do not, they face a ‘peak earnings’ quarter where increasing revenues inflate quarterly earnings that cannot be sustained over the long run.  The result is an apparent paradox of record earnings followed by apparently disproportionate fall in stock values.

Stock prices fall on the news of a record quarter because investors know that such earnings levels are not sustainable.  Investors are right if executives remain focused on cost cutting and control because rising revenues and a strengthening economy will force them to add costs back into their model to support the recovery.    They have to because during the recession all they did was dehydrate their operations, they did not change the way they work, so the only thing they can do is add back costs as revenues return.

Adopting a productivity focus that changes the way we work is the only path to being able to lock in productivity gains and earnings that drive stock prices.

Productivity and efficiency sound like the same thing, but the differences are important as summarized in the graphic below.

Productivity is particularly important to CIOs and IT leaders as it creates room for IT to be more than a commodity, cost cutting and consolidation service.  Achieving productivity gains requires changing the way people work so they work smarter, achieve more, deliver greater quality and realize the value of their efforts.   Those goals are all qualitatively different then cutting costs with IT.

I believe that CIOs will have to answer the following question when reporting their 2010 accomplishments:

How has IT raised enterprise productivity?

IT has the tools, it manages the information, communications and applications that determine the way the enterprise works.  Therefore they are critical source of creating and leveraging productivity gains.  It is also a critical source of IT’s business impact and value.

Productivity is a universal good that creates value in growth and protects earnings in down markets.  Regardless of your situation—making productivity one of your key goals for 2010 reflects a positive transition in your enterprise strategy.

Stock market analysts and economists postulated that the US and Western Europe would go into recession, but China and its domestic growth rate would keep Asia in positive territory.  Those views turned out to be incorrect as the global financial crisis hit everyone, everywhere hard.

The issues of decoupling is back on the table as it seems that while we all went into this recession together, its possible that in the recovery Asia is decoupled from the west.  This means that while the West experiences a sluggish economy, domestic demand in India and China will lead to a rapid recovery.

There are already signs that this is happening.  U.S. exports to China are up.  The BBC this morning was discussing the Indian Central bank plans for removing government stimulus in the face of a projected strong growth rate.  At the same time, unemployment, weak consumer demand and potential national defaults in Europe loom large.

If Asian and Western economies are decoupling in the recovery then it has some significant impact on Western economic policy and corporate strategies.  First, a decoupled world means that there is no one country or region at the front of the train pulling the world forward.  In a coupled world, that used to be the U.S. whose domestic growth fueled demand for imports from Asia and therefore global growth.

Decoupling reduces the potential of Asia leading the way in a recovery as domestic Asian companies feed their own growth.  This has been one of the under reported stories of China during the recession which has concentrated on building both domestic demand and supply.  This is not to say that Asian growth will feel a drag from weaker growth in the west.  It is to say that a decoupled global economy will work by new rules.

Under this scenario, growth in the East will not necessarily translate to growth in the West as many Western companies now produce and service global companies out of Asia.  Sure Western companies will earn financial returns meeting local Asian demand with Asian supply, but that will do little to simulate western domestic demand or employment.  Here are a few thoughts on what to look for in a decoupled recovery:

• Asian growth rates running 4% or more ahead of rates in the  West.
• Return of commodity price pressures for industrial inputs in general and food in particular
• Rising Asian interest rates that drive higher interest rates in the West as Asian central banks seek to combat inflation and the West needs to retain Eastern investment to fund rising government debt
• Continued weakness in global shipping levels and container rates, as East-West product movements transition to East-East shipments
• Stronger inter-Asian M&A activity vs. Western M&A as companies view to buy market share and access to a growing market
• Targeted Asian acquisition of long-term growth play in the West, particularly companies that are part of the bedrock of global economic growth.  Telecoms perhaps, engineering companies, logistics and transportation

Remember these are just theories.

Maybe this is just an idea driven by human nature.  After all we can feel poor when we see our neighbor’s doing well.  The opportunity to feel this way is more prevalent in a recovery than a recession where group think sees everything going in on direction – down.

We live in a global economy with complex and interconnected flows of goods that has produced growth that has lifted millions out of poverty as well as created economic crisis that impoverish us all.  Economic decoupling in the recovery is just one of the scenarios that we need to consider and evaluate.

This post concentrates on how you use the information to reveal the plan in a way that demonstrates IT’s contribution.  The post will use the sample action plan, shown in the figure below, to illustrate this point.

Plunking down this piece of paper or presenting it as a slide in a Powerpoint deck all at once communicates that IT is complex, engages in many activities and therefore must be costly.

Being introduced to the action plan all at once gives executives the impression of a bureaucratic or administrative approach.  The full plan requires them to read all the way across the plan to understand why they are investing in IT.

ITs contribution to business value should be direct and tangible and it can be when CIOs choose to communicate their plans based on business results rather than operational activities.  Making those connections is as easy as folding a piece of paper.

You may have noticed that the example above is divided into four columns of equal width.  This is deliberate, as the first step is folding the action plan according to the instructions outlined in the figure below.  I apologize for the simplistic instructions.  I know that CIOs can fold a piece of paper into four columns, but I err on the side of being clear and graphical.

Folding the action plan gives you the flexibility to reveal the plan in stages rather than showing the entire piece of paper all at once.

Savvy CIOs discuss what they are going to do in a structured way and avoid common communications mistakes that give the impression that IT is a back office, administrative function.

They start communicating the connection between objective and result.  This is achieved by folding in the middle two columns, shown in the figure below, and having a discussion concentrating on what you are trying to achieve (objectives) and why that is important (the results).  That connection is the business context for the change program.

The value-based view should be the first and most frequently communicated connection within the plan.  Folding the plan in this way enables you to have direct discussion of the connections between the objectives and the tangible results they will achieve.

This is often not the case particularly after the plan is approved and management attention turns to execution.  Then the view changes to one concentrating on activities and gaps show in the figure below

The activities view often dominates CIO and IT executive discussions.  Ask them what IT’s priorities are and they will talk about IT activities and projects rather than the value they create.  This view is understandable as activities dominate the day-to-day management agenda.

However, just because you spend time on activities does not mean that the activities are valuable.  Rather the results they create are the source of value.

Too often CIOs introduce themselves and IT in terms of the projects they are doing rather than the results they are partnering to create.  The message executives take away from the activities view is “We are from corporate and we are here to help.”

A folded action plan creates a tool for connecting IT activities with results.

Sure it’s a simple tool based on what you learned as a child.  But this simple tool makes the connections between IT objectives and results clear and physically tangible.  It allows the CIO to reveal the connections between objectives, issues, actions and results in stages rather than bombarding the audience with complexity and assumed cost.

Balanced scorecards, portfolio management and transformation programs all have their role, but I would suggest that the savvy CIO starts simple and keeps it simple, as simple as a single folded piece of paper.

“People are our most important … (asset, resource, strategy, etc)” This is one of the more familiar phrase executives and managers will say, particularly in light of the past year when people, their ideas and their personal sacrifices contributed so much to company survival.  2009 was a year where your people made the year as customer demand fell, bankers tightened credit and the economy contracted.

People are more than the most important asset/resource/etc – they are the source of current operational performance and future competitive advantage for the following simple reasons:

It’s a person and your people.

“People are our most important … (asset, resource, strategy, etc)” This is one of the more familiar phrase executives and managers will say, particularly in light of the past year when people, their ideas and their personal sacrifices contributed so much to company survival.  2009 was a year where your people made the year as customer demand fell, bankers tightened credit and the economy contracted.

People are more than the most important asset/resource/etc – they are the source of current operational performance and future competitive advantage for the following simple reasons:

People get things done.  When I was a commercial lender one of my customers told me, “you know mark, people write checks” meaning that people made the decision if you were going to get paid, not a computer system, nor the terms on a piece of paper.

People are adaptable. Despite what management guru’s say, people do change and they are the most adaptable resource a company relies upon, particularly in IT.  Don’t believe me, then just go into your server room and ask the hardware to be more adaptive!

People have the knowledge and ideas you need. Innovation and improvement come from people and their insight, knowledge and experience.  Your people are closest to your operational problems, they know where best to cut costs, where the value really is in your operations.  Too often we pay lip service to their knowledge with the corporate ‘feel good’ suggestion box rather than listening and acting on their knowledge and insight.

People make sacrifices. People can see, believe and sacrifice for the future where your customers, suppliers and executives can only see the short term.  Many organization’s asked their people last year to freeze salaries, accept lower benefits and work harder for the good of the company – and people responded while others took advantage of the situation.

So what? Isn’t this all stating the obvious to the point that its become a cliché?  The cynic would say that such statements are a prelude to large executive bonuses, layoffs or plant closings and while they may be correct that does not make it right.

During the past year we have asked a lot from the people we know at work, at home and in the community.  By in large we and the people we know have responded with courage, heart, intelligence and collaboration.

Now is the time, after the holidays and during the darkest part of winter to turn around and recognize, thank, welcome and acknowledge the people who have made the past year as tolerable as possible.

Chances are that they will not expect it, but they deserve it.  They will recognize that you are giving them your most important resource – your time, your attention and your heartfelt emotion – all of which are your most important asset, resource, strategy, etc.

So what? Isn’t this all stating the obvious to the point that its become a cliché?  The cynic would say that such statements are a prelude to large executive bonuses, layoffs or plant closings and whiel they may be correct that does not make it right.

During the past year we have asked a lot from the people we know at work, at home and in the community.  By in large we and the people we know have responded with courage, heart, intelligence and collaboration.

Now is the time, after the holidays and during the darkest part of winter to turn around and recognize, thank, welcome and acknowledge the people who have made the past year as tolerable as possible.

Chances are that they will not expect it, but they deserve it.  They will recognize that you are giving them your most important resource – your time, your attention and your heartfelt emotion – all of which are your most important asset, resource, strategy, etc.