Common Management Errors (100)

C) Not Understanding The Limitations Of Focusing On "One-Size-Fits-All' Approach

Introduction

Any company's success has traditionally been synonymous with the profit maximisation and shareholders' satisfaction. This has encouraged interventions like downsizing, rightsizing, consolidating, re-engineering, TQM, benchmarking, continuous improvement, team building, process, re-engineering, customer service, agile, etc. Most of these measures are aimed at reducing expenses and they neglect the human side of any organisation. Furthermore, often management's active participation is encouraged by the bait of higher salaries, stock options and other perks, etc.

However, no single initiative (sometimes called a 'silver bullet or 'magic wand' ) on its own can successfully achieve organisational change:
"...silver bullet strategies inevitably fail to fulfill their promise of all-round transformation. To change an organisation means changing the whole network of its multitude of dimensions..."
The Canadian Institute of Cultural Affairs, 2012.

A more holistic approach is required by starting with a world, or big picture, view. This means understanding the externalities that can influence your industry and organisation such as global socio-political-economic events or factors (such as demographic, wars, pandemics,  recessions, inflation, etc.:
"...in this understanding, the first thing an organisation must clarify is the understanding out of which it operates. Then it must create the consensus to choose a new and desired paradigm. When the image shifts, the priority values shift. It is not simply the focus, structure and leadership of the organisation that change, but the core values, skills, and operating style. To choose the new paradigm, an organisation needs a vision. It needs an image not just of greater size or profitability, but of higher maturity and fulfilment. It also needs a way to see where it is stuck at present, and an overview of the whole journey of possible development......the foundations of some models lie in the science of quantum physics, self-organising systems and complexity theory..."
The Canadian Institute of Cultural Affairs, 2012