Agility and Collaboration are the New Black

John Chambers is an executive at Cisco Systems that retooled the way the company worked and changed the fundamental way the company moved in the market. When told it was impossible to have a continuous growth of over 5% he proved it by actions. He looked at what will be needed by the world in the future and made sure his company would be in the best position to give it to them. He did this when it was needed, even if the global economy made it more difficult. He would make sure his company was in the best position to rise the recovery bubble but still not crash when the economy did the same. He diversified the company's focus by having dozens of active projects instead of one or two company-wide. This allowed the areas that performed poorly to be overshadowed by the areas that were growing beyond all expectations. How did he do this?

Chambers took the work force and made teams from functional areas. When a new project was proposed, a team was made from experts within the company to generate a draft and a working business model. The expectation was that if the company could not be best or second best in that market with at least 40% market share then it was not a sound venture. Expectations were set so that everyone knew that to have the project not fail was not enough, it had to flourish. Collaboration was the new kid in town and people were more productive because of it.

How was Cisco able to be so successful time after time? Ask Papa Johns. "Better Ingredients, Better Pizza." While this is by no means the same market or even the same ball park it still holds true. Cisco hired the best and brightest minds out there. They started with the best brains, took the best ideas they had, and then they packaged that into a product that the masses would benefit from. Cisco knew that when you start with a team that has above average performance you will get a superior performance in the final product. Not all companies can have the best of the best, but they can choose to use everyone's best talents on every project that could use them.

New ideas are what drives this economy and the best ones will rise to the top but only if you listen.