Key Business Solutions: Essential problem-solving tools and techniques that every manager needs to know (Financial Times Series)

✍ Scribed by Antonio Weiss

• Publisher: Financial Times/ Prentice Hall
• Year: 2011
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 225
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This book explains how to resolve every challenge faced on a day-to-day basis in your business by presenting an unbeatable inventory of proven problem solving tools and techniques to help you tackle your toughest business dilemmas effectively.

You will learn how to:

·         Overcome any business challenge with robust logic and structure

·         How to break down problems and make your workload lighter

·         Deliver the ‘killer’ recommendations

·         Discover how to successfully implement change in people and organisations

·         How to keep yourself, your team, and your stakeholders happy

·         How to use an effective hypothesis-driven approach to problem solving

Using case studies, a ‘best practice example’ and at least one figurative table or figure, every dilemma is bought to life equipping you with the very best tools to confront any problem your business may face.

‘The most successful businesses don’t avoid problems – they solve them.  This practical, insightful and entertaining book guides you through how to do this.  An indispensable resource for any manager.'

Richard Newton, Business consultant and best-selling author      

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'One of the key attributes in running a business successfully is the ability to see a situation in perspective.  Too often the real issues go unrecognised, signs are misread, an opportunity slips by, the wrong problem is addressed. Only in retrospect is it obvious what should have been done.

It is not easy, but the tools and techniques covered in Key Business Solutions should help.’

Sir George Cox, Author of the HM Treasury Cox Review of Creativity in UK Business and former Chairman of the Design Council

✦ Table of Contents

Cover
Key business solutions
Contents
about the author
acknowledgements
Publisher’s acknowledgements
Introduction
Part one The OBTAIN problem-solving process
Outline the question
The problem may be big, but it should fit on one page
The key issues you need to know to solve the problem
Break down the issues
Untangling the mess
Prioritise your workload to maximise your effort: output ratio
Test the hypothesis
You are the doctor, the problem is your patient
Analyse the problem
Without data you have nothing
Insightful interviewing
If you want to get to the root cause of the problem, just ask ‘why?’
Making spreadsheet models easy
Imagine the solution
Devising the optimal solution
Making change happen
Notify the stakeholders
Writing compelling reports
Making great presentations
Managing the stakeholders
Understand who your stakeholders are and how to communicate with them
Trust makes the world go around
You are the most important stakeholder
Managing the team
setting up the team to ensure success
Helping others reach their goal
Feedback works both ways
A final thought
Part two Critical business tools and frameworks
Critical business tools and frameworks
4Ps of marketing
5Cs of strategy
Ansoff matrix
BCG growth-share matrix
Benchmarking
Brainstorming
De Bono’s six thinking hats
Drill-down analysis
Kano analysis
McClelland’s theory of needs
McKinsey 7s framework
PesTeL
Porter’s five forces
SWOT
Value chain analysis
Appendix: How the tools and techniques fit into the OBTAIN process
Further reading and references
Index