Chapter 9 Part III Implementing Blue Ocean Strategy Chapter VII Overcoming Key Organizational Barriers
After the company has formulated a blue ocean strategy for a profitable business model, it should implement this strategy.Of course, there are challenges in implementing any strategy. Whether it is a red ocean strategy or a blue ocean strategy, companies, like individuals, often have difficulties in transforming ideas into actions. However, compared with red ocean strategy, blue ocean strategy means challenging the status quo. From a value curve similar to others to a low-cost strategic transformation, execution is even more difficult.
Business managers are proving to us that the challenge is formidable.They face four major obstacles.The first obstacle is cognitive. It is necessary to wake up employees and make them aware of the necessity of strategic transformation.Red ocean strategy may not be the path to future profitable growth, but people are comfortable with it and businesses can get by in red oceans, so why bother?
The second obstacle is limited resources.The greater the degree of strategic transformation, the more resources will be required to execute it.But in many of the businesses we study, resources are being cut, not added.
The third hurdle is incentives.How to motivate key personnel to quickly and powerfully execute strategy and break away from the status quo?That could take years, and managers don't have that much time.
The final hurdle is corporate politics.As one manager noted, "In our company, you can get knocked over before you even get up."
While all companies encounter these hurdles to varying degrees, and perhaps some only face a few of them, knowing how to overcome them is key to reducing organizational risk.This leads to the fifth principle of blue ocean strategy: to overcome key organizational obstacles and promote the implementation of blue ocean strategy.
However, to do this effectively, companies must set aside conventional wisdom about implementing change, which holds that the bigger the change, the more resources and time it takes.Instead, you need to leave the traditional experience behind and adopt what we call “tipping point leadership,” which allows us to quickly overcome these obstacles and cheaply break through the status quo and win over employees.
Take the New York City Police Department (NYPD), which implemented a blue ocean strategy in the public sector in the 1990s.When Bill Brayton became New York City Police Commissioner in 1994, he faced difficulties few had experienced.In the early 1990s, New York City had a high murder rate, with crooks, mafia, and armed robberies filling the headlines.The law and order situation in New York City is terrible, but Breton's budget is frozen.In fact, after more than three decades of continuous crime growth, many sociologists assert that New York no longer has the authority of the police.New Yorkers spoke out, and a New York Post headline pointedly called, "Time for David to Act," a direct appeal to then-mayor David Dunkins to quickly reduce crime.Yet the morale of the NYPD's 36,000 officers has plummeted with poor pay, dangerous working conditions, long hours, and no prospect of promotion, not to mention the impact of budget cuts, dilapidated equipment, and corruption. up.
In business terms, the NYPD is financially stretched, its 36,000 employees underpaid and underincentivized; its client base, New Yorkers, is disgruntled, and increased crime, fear, and chaos mean performance is suffering. Quick slide.Political battles within the police department made matters worse.In short, leading the NYPD's strategic transformation has been a management nightmare far beyond the imagination of most administrators, while competitors—meaning criminals—are powerful and increasingly aggressive.
Yet in less than two years, without adding a penny to the budget, Breton managed to transform New York into the safest city in America by adopting a blue ocean strategy in policing management, breaking the red ocean state, and implementing a policing approach revolution.Between 1994 and 1996, NYPD's "profits" jumped: 39% fewer major crimes, 50% fewer murders, 35% fewer burglaries; won "clients": Gallup poll shows Confidence in the NYPD rises from 37 percent to 73 percent; employees won, too: Internal survey shows job satisfaction in the department hits new highs.As one patrolman said: "This guy (Braton) pulled us back from the road to hell."Perhaps the most impressive change was not confined to Breton's tenure, there was a fundamental shift in the NYPD's organizational culture and strategy, and crime continued to decline after Breton left office in 1996.
In the process of breaking through the status quo, few company leaders have faced the severe challenges that Brayton experienced, and even fewer people can achieve the leapfrog performance created by Brayton under such conditions, let alone when he met. Under such harsh organizational conditions.Even Jack Welch spent ten years and hundreds of millions of dollars to realize GE's restructuring and transformation.
And unlike traditional experience, Brayton achieved such a breakthrough in record time with minimal resources: improved employee morale and created a win-win situation for all parties.And this is not the first time Breton has turned things around strategically, but his fifth, and the other four have also succeeded.Although he also faced all four barriers that many managers consistently claim limit their ability to execute blue ocean strategy: cognitive barriers that prevent employees from seeing the need for drastic change; resource barriers common to businesses; morale barriers that discourage employees; and Internal and external political barriers to change (see Figure 7-1).
The tipping point leadership approach dates back to the field of epidemiology and the tipping point theory.This approach shows that in any organization, once people's confidence and energy reach a tipping point, they can infect the entire organization to move in a certain direction, and fundamental change occurs.The key to launching such a movement is concentration, not dispersion.
Tipping point leadership is based on the seldom exploited fact that in every organization there are some people, some behaviors, or activities that exert a remarkable influence on the ultimate performance.Therefore, unlike traditional experience, overcoming a huge challenge does not require a proportional investment of time and resources, but instead focuses on identifying the key factors with extraordinary influence and letting them play a role. Save resources and time.
Managers who use the explosive leadership approach answer the following key questions: What factors or actions have the extraordinary positive impact?What factors produce the greatest effectiveness per dollar of resources?What motivates key personnel to move towards change?What factors can overcome the obstacles posed by corporate politics?As long as you focus on the key points with extraordinary influence, the tipping point leadership method can break the four barriers that limit the implementation of blue ocean strategy, and promote the rapid and low-cost implementation of strategy.
Exactly how to give full play to the leverage of extraordinary influencing factors, overcome the four major obstacles, turn thoughts into actions, and promote the implementation of blue ocean strategy.
In the process of enterprise change, the most difficult battle is to make people understand the need for strategic transformation and to form a consensus on its goals.Most CEOs hope to complete the transformation only by citing some numbers and issuing higher indicators: "The performance of the enterprise has only two choices: meet these goals or exceed these goals"
But we know that numbers can be manipulated.Insisting on broad goals will only encourage a runaway budget process.This in turn creates hostility and suspicion in all parts of the organization.Even if these figures are not manipulated, they can have the effect of misleading, for example, salespeople who take commissions rarely care about the cost of sales.
Also, information expressed numerically can be difficult to remember.The case for change appears abstract and far removed from the world of the bottom line managers, the very people CEOs need to woo.The line managers who did well felt that the criticism was not aimed at them, that the problem was only with upper management.And the underperforming managers feel they are being warned, some of them worried about their positions, and may be more concerned with what other job opportunities are in the market than with trying to fix the company's existing problems.
The tipping point leadership approach does not rely on numbers to break down organizational cognitive barriers.To quickly overcome cognitive hurdles, Tipping Point leaders like Brayton focus their energies on actions with extraordinary impact: making people see and experience harsh realities.Research in neuroscience and cognitive science has shown that people remember and respond most to what they see and experience, and "what you see is what you believe."In terms of experience, positive stimuli reinforce behavior, while negative stimuli change attitudes and behavior.Simply put, the better a child dips his finger in icing and tastes it, the better it tastes the more he will lick it again and again, without parents needing to encourage the behavior.Conversely, if a child sticks his finger to the stove, he will never stick it a second time.After one bad experience, the child will change his behavior on his own, again without the need for parents to worry about repeating the same offense.On the other hand, experiences with no-contact, invisible, or hard-to-perceive consequences, such as seeing only a page full of abstract numbers, are less impressive and easily forgotten.
Tipping Point Leadership is built on a deep understanding of people's voluntary inner drive to spark rapid change, rather than breaking down cognitive barriers with numbers, numbers can only make people feel the need for change in a radically different way .
To break out of the status quo, employees must face their worst problems.Managers at any level cannot be allowed to assume reality.Numbers are not necessarily reliable, nor can they give you inspiration.Confronting poor performance is shocking, inescapable, and motivating.This direct experience has an extraordinary impact in quickly breaking down people's cognitive barriers.
For example, the New York subway in the 1990s was so full of fear that it was nicknamed the "electric sewer."Its income plummeted because of the boycott of the subway.But members of the New York Transit Police Department denied this.why?Only 3% of major crimes in this city happen on the subway.Therefore, no matter how loudly the public shouted, the police department turned a deaf ear to it, and there was no need to reflect on the need to adjust the police strategy.
At this time Brayton became the chief, and within a few weeks he changed the state of mind of the police.How?Not by coercion, or arguing over numbers.Instead, let the middle and high-level executives-starting with himself-go to sit in the "electrical sewer" sooner or later.And that didn't happen before Breton arrived.
The statistics on the screens tell the cops it's safe to ride the subway, but what they see is what every New Yorker faces every day, that the subway system is on the brink of anarchy: hordes of young people Loitering in the carriages, fare evaders jumping through the entrance, graffiti and beggars forcibly begging everywhere, drunkards occupy the seats in disorder.After a field ride, police officers can no longer hide from the ugly reality, and no one can debate whether current police strategy needs to be changed quickly and effectively.
Presenting the worst reality to your boss can also quickly change their ideology.A simple method can quickly sensitize the boss to the needs of leadership.However, few leaders know how to use the power of this quick wake-up method. On the contrary, they use numbers that lack a sense of urgency and emotional drive, or cite some typical examples to gain support.While these approaches may be effective, they are nowhere near as swift and effective at breaking through executives' cognitive barriers as a worst-case scenario.
For example, when Brayton was in charge of the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority Police Division, the Transit Authority board decided to buy small patrol cars that were cheap and low-maintenance.This does not satisfy Breton's vigilante patrol strategy.Breton chose not to fight the decision, nor did he ask for a larger budget, which would take months to evaluate and could ultimately be rejected anyway.Instead, Brayton simply invited the general manager of the Transit Authority to visit his unit and inspect the area.
To make the general manager understand the dire situation he was trying to rectify, Brayton picked him up in a police car identical to the one the Transit Authority was about to order.He stuffed things around the seats beforehand, giving the general manager a sense of how little legroom a six-foot cop has, and then Brayton drove through every pothole in the road.Brayton also put on a belt, handcuffs, and a gun to show the general manager how little space an officer has for their tools.Two hours later, the general manager asked to get out of the car, asking how Brayton could have endured so long in such a crowded car, let alone with the criminal in the back.Brayton finally got the big patrol cars his new strategy needed.
To break down the cognitive barrier, not only do you need to get your managers out of the office to see what's really going on, but you need them to listen to customer complaints themselves.Instead of relying on market research, to what extent has your team proactively and intuitively understood the market and met with the most disgruntled customers to hear what they care about?Have you ever figured out why sales didn't match your expectations for the product?Simply put, there is no substitute for meeting and listening to customer grievances directly.
In the 1970s, Boston's 4th police precinct, home to Symphony Hall, the Christian Science Church and other cultural institutions, was suffering from a crime wave, and the public was constantly threatened by crime; Difference.But even with the exodus, Brayton's police force feels like it's doing a good job, and its performance metrics are top-notch compared with other police departments: Shorter call response times and higher felony detection rates.To resolve this paradox, Brayton arranged a series of conversations between officers and residents.
It didn't take long to find the gap in understanding.While officers prided themselves on improved response times and felony punishments, citizens neither cared nor appreciated these gains; few felt threatened by mass crime.It is the drunkards, beggars, whores, and knaves who hurt and trouble them.
The dialogue will cause the police to thoroughly review the focus of their work, turn to the blue ocean strategy, and re-examine the "broken windows theory."As the crime rate drops, the neighborhood regains its tranquility.
When it comes time to wake your organization up to the need to disrupt the status quo and achieve strategic transformation, do you just cite numbers?Or put your managers, employees, and superiors (and yourself) in the worst possible operating situation?Are your managers listening directly to the complaints of disappointed customers?Or outsource your eyesight and just have a market research agency send out surveys?
After members of the organization accept the need for a strategic shift and agree somewhat to the framework of the new strategy, most leaders face the harsh reality of limited resources.At this point, the vast majority of reformist managers choose one of two approaches. They either become less ambitious, thereby reducing staff morale and effort, or talk to the banks and shareholders. Fight for more resources, the latter is not only time-consuming, but also distracts from core issues.Not that this approach is necessarily unnecessary or worthwhile, but getting more resources is often a lengthy, politically bound process.
How can the strategic transformation of an organization be achieved with few resources?The tipping point leadership method does not focus on striving for more resources, but also emphasizes the value of existing resources.When resources are scarce, leaders should leverage the three factors of extraordinary influence to multiply the value of existing resources.These three factors are: hot spots, cold spots and horse trading.
A hotspot is an activity with a high potential performance gain that requires little resource investment.Conversely, a cold spot refers to an activity that involves a lot of effort but yields little.Every organization typically has many hot and cold spots.Exchanging supplies is to exchange excess resources in one area of your unit with excess resources in another unit to fill in the resource gap.By learning to make good use of current resources, companies often find that they can completely break down resource barriers.
Which actions consume a lot of your resources with little performance impact?Conversely, which activities create the greatest performance with few resources?By framing the problem in this way, the organization can quickly gain insight into the need to free up low-yield resources and reallocate them to high-yield places.In this way, low cost and high profit can be pursued and realized at the same time.
Brayton's predecessors in the New York Transit Police Department argued that the subway should be safe by having an officer ride every line and patrol every entrance and exit.Increasing profits (here refers to reducing crime) means that costs (referring to police officers) will increase to a level that cannot be supported by the budget. The basic logic is that only when resources increase year-on-year will performance improve-this is exactly what most companies see in terms of performance benefits internal logic.
Instead of asking for more officers, however, Brayton deployed police to hotspots, causing crime, fear, and chaos on the subway to drop dramatically to record lows.His analysis shows that although the subway system consists of many lines and entrances and exits, most crimes occur on a few stations and lines.He also found that some hotspots that have a particularly high impact on crime prevention are understaffed, while lines and stops where almost no crime occurs have just as many police officers.The answer is to reallocate the police force to hotspots to fight crime, so that the crime rate will drop significantly while the police force remains the same.
Similarly, before Brayton came to the New York Police Department, its Narcotics Division was on duty 9 to 5, five days a week, and its manpower accounted for only 5% of the entire police department.To identify hotspots, during a meeting with NYPD leaders, Bratton's Deputy Commissioner for Crime Strategies, Jack Maipe, asked the audience what percentage of crime was estimated to be related to drug use?Most answered 50%, some said 70%, and the lowest estimate was 30%.So, as Maipu pointed out, the Narcotics Division, which accounts for less than 5% of the total police officers, is understaffed. The Narcotics Division usually works from Monday to Friday, but most of the drug dealing occurs on weekends. Drug-related crimes also always happen on weekends.Why was the original working method never questioned?
When these facts are found, hot spots are also identified.Brayton's proposal for a massive reconfiguration of police force and resources in the NYPD was quickly embraced.In response, Brayton added police and resources to hotspots, and drug crimes plummeted as a result.
Where did he get the resources to do so?It turned out that he also assessed the cold spots of the organization at the same time.
Leaders need to find cold spots to free up resources.Still taking the subway system as an example, Brayton found that one of the biggest cold spots was the process of escorting criminals to court for detention procedures.On average, it takes officers 16 hours to bring a suspect to an inner-city courthouse, which must be the case for even the most minor of crimes.The time spent prevents officers from patrolling subways and creating value.
Breton made a radical change in this.Instead of taking criminals to court, "arrest vans" are used as processing centers.Old buses, refurbished into miniature police stations, stop right outside the subway station.Instead of taking a suspect to a downtown courthouse, officers simply escort him to an arrest van on the side of the street.This cut the processing time from 16 hours to one hour, giving officers more time to patrol the subway to catch criminals.
In addition to redeploying resources within a unit, tipping point leaders can skillfully exchange resources they don't want for those they want.Again in Breton's case, the heads of public sector organizations know that because public sector resources are very limited, the size of their budgets and the number of people they manage are often hotly debated, which makes them reluctant to publish their excess resources, let alone make them available to other departments, because that would risk losing control of those resources.Over time, the result is that some organizations have a surplus of resources they don't need and a shortage of resources they need.
Brayton's legal and policy advisor, Dean Eiseman (now Rhode Island's police chief), played a key dealmaker role when he first became New York's traffic police commissioner in 1990.Eiseman found that the Transit Police Department was short on office space and had many spare cars that weren't being used.On the other hand, the New York Patrol Detachment is short on vehicles, but has ample office space.Eiseman and Brayton offered to trade the vehicle for the office, and officers from the patrol detachment readily accepted.The officers of the Transit Police Department are also very happy to be able to work in a prime location in the city center.The deal boosted Brayton's credibility within the organization, making it easier for him to push through some more fundamental changes, while also convincing his bosses that he was a problem solver.
Figure 7-2 illustrates how Breton thoroughly deployed the resources of the Transport Police Department to break through the red ocean state and implement the blue ocean strategy.The vertical axis represents the relative level of resource allocation, and the horizontal axis represents the different elements of the investment strategy.By weakening or even removing some of the traditional features of the Transit Police Department, while adding and creating some new ones, Brayton achieved a dramatic shift in the allocation of resources.
Figure 7-2
Elimination and reduction actions reduce costs for the organization, while addition and creation of new elements require increased investment.
However, as can be seen in the strategic layout map, the total investment of resources remains basically unchanged, while the value to citizens has increased significantly. The practice of police coverage in the subway system has been canceled and replaced with a target strategy for hotspot areas, making transportation Police departments can respond more effectively to subway crime.It reduces the time and energy that police officers spend on the detention process and other cold-spot activities, creates the practice of using arrest cars to deal with suspects, and allows police forces to focus on maintaining law and order in the subway, thereby greatly increasing the value of the police force.Increase investment in dealing with daily crime activities, rather than investment in major cases, and the focus of police resources is on those crimes that pose a threat to the daily lives of citizens.Through these actions, the New York Transit Police Department has significantly improved the performance of its officers, freeing them from tedious administrative tasks to focus on crime scenes where they are focused.
Are you still reporting on stale assumptions when allocating resources?Or is it an effort to focus resources on hotspots?Where is your hotspot?Which activities are the most performant and resource-scarce?What are your cool spots?Which activities are consuming resources but not performing well?Do you communicate with each other?And do you have those things that can be used to communicate with each other?
In order to reach the tipping point of the organization and implement the blue ocean strategy, you must let employees clearly understand the necessity of strategic transformation and specify how to achieve the goal with limited resources.For a new strategy or an action to be taken, people not only need to realize what needs to be done, but they must put this knowledge into practice in a lasting and effective way.
How can you motivate your employees quickly and cheaply?When most business leaders need to disrupt the status quo or transform an organization, they often articulate grand strategic views and engage in massive top-down mobilization.This is because they believe that to achieve a large-scale response, there must be a corresponding large-scale action.But for most large companies, large-scale mobilization is not only very difficult, but also an expensive and time-consuming process.It is as impossible to realize those major strategic assumptions by only talking about it without putting it into sincere actions, which is tantamount to turning around an aircraft carrier in a bathtub.
So is there another way?Instead of attacking on all fours and spreading out change efforts, Tipping Point leaders strive for a centralized breakthrough in which they focus on three extraordinary factors to motivate employees, which we call kingpins, fishbowl, and task breakdown ( atomization).
For strategic change to have real impact, employees at all levels must act together.However, if you want the power of positive change to have a broad mass base within the organization, you cannot disperse your focus, but should concentrate on the key influencers of the organization, that is, the masterminds.They are natural leaders in the organization, respected, persuasive, or capable of opening resources or blocking passage.Just like the central pin in bowling, hit them and the other pins will be knocked down.This prevents the organization from dealing with everyone, but in the end everyone is touched.Since masterminds are a relatively small minority in most organizations, it is easy for the CEO to target and mobilize them.
In the New York City Police Department, for example, Brayton counted 76 department commanders as his key influencers and masterminds.Why?Because the commander of each police station directly controls 200 to 400 police officers, motivating these 76 commanders can drive and inspire 36,000 police officers to accept the new security management strategy.
To continuously and effectively mobilize the enthusiasm of mastermind characters, the key is to be able to continuously put their behavior under the spotlight so that people can see it. We call it fishbowl management.Putting a mastermind in a fishbowl greatly increases the risk of his inaction.The laggards are revealed under the lights, and the rapid changers can also shine on the stage.To be successful, aquarium management must be based on transparency, inclusiveness, and process fairness.
In the NYPD, Brayton's Fishbowl is part of the biweekly Crime Suppression Strategy Review (Compstat).The meeting brought together the city's top police officers to assess the performance of all 76 police department commanders in implementing the new strategy.The commanders of each police station are also required to attend, and above the sheriff, the deputy chief and the district police chief are also required to attend.Breton himself tried to be present.Each department commander was asked at the meeting whether their crime-stopping performance had improved or decreased under the new strategy, and the graphs were displayed simultaneously, conclusively showing their performance in implementing the new strategy.Commanders must interpret the charts, describe how their officers solve problems, and account for increases and decreases in performance.This wide-ranging meeting shows the results and responsibilities clearly in front of everyone.
The result of this approach is that a strong performance culture develops in weeks rather than months, let alone years.Because no commander wants to lose face in front of others, they all want to show their hands in front of their colleagues and superiors.In a fishbowl, an incompetent police station commander cannot cover up his own faults by blaming a neighboring police station for its shortcomings, since representatives of the neighboring district are also present and ready to fire back.In fact, CSIS handouts include photos of police station commanders who will be questioned, emphasizing that commanders must be held accountable for police station results.
In the same way, excellent talents who work well in their own jurisdictions and assist other jurisdictions will also be appreciated and recognized by everyone because of fish tank management.At the same time, this kind of meeting also gives commanders an opportunity to get together, compare and learn from each other.Before Breton arrived, police commanders rarely got together as a team.Over time, this style of fish tank management permeated down to the grassroots, and police station commanders also followed Brayton's example and held their own strategic assessment meetings.With the performance of executing the strategy exposed, police commanders are highly motivated to move their officers toward the new strategy.
However, for this approach to work, the organization must also ensure that the way it operates is a fair process. A "fair process" means involving everyone affected by the new strategy, explaining the rationale for decisions, why officers are promoted or demoted, and clarifying expectations for officer performance.No one at the NYPD's Crime Deterrence Strategy Review would argue that the starting line is unfair.All masterminds are placed in a glass fishbowl, and the performance evaluation of each commander, as well as the reasons for promotion or demotion, are all clear and transparent, and each meeting sets clear rules for each person's future performance. expectations.
In this way, a fair-process signal is sent to people that while change must be driven, there is a level playing field and that leaders recognize the intellectual and emotional value of employees.This greatly reduces the skepticism that almost inevitably exists in every employee's mind when a company tries to make a strategic transformation.Fair process and fishbowl management's emphasis on pure performance drives and supports people on the path to change, while at the same time demonstrating the intellectual and emotional respect managers have for their employees.
A final and particularly effective influencing factor is decomposition thinking.Breaking down tasks and defining strategic challenges are linked, and this is one of the most delicate and sensitive tasks of Tipping Point leadership.Change cannot be successful unless people believe that the strategic challenge is achievable.Faced with this, Breton's goals in New York were so ambitious it was hard to believe.Who would believe that a single individual could turn this megacity from the most dangerous place in the country to the safest?Who would invest time and energy in chasing an impossible dream?
To make the goals of the challenge achievable, Brayton broke it down into small target tasks, linked to all levels of police officers.The challenge for the NYPD, as he puts it, is to restore safety to the streets of New York City "block by block, precinct by precinct, borough by borough."It is practical to define the strategic tasks in this way.For street patrol officers, the job is to keep the neighborhoods they patrol safe, nothing more.For the police station commander, his task is to ensure the safety of the police district under his jurisdiction, nothing more.And the person in charge of each large urban area also has a specific goal within his power, that is, to ensure the safety of the large urban area.No one can say that too much is required of them, nor claim that their goals are beyond their reach.In this way, the responsibility for implementing Bretton's blue ocean strategy shifted from himself to the NYPD's 36,000 officers.
Are you indiscriminately trying to mobilize the masses?Or are you focusing on key influencers, your masterminds?Have you turned on the spotlight and invited masterminds into a fishbowl based on a fair process?Or are you just asking for high performance and crossing your fingers until next quarter's statistics come in?Do you publish grand strategic visions?Or should the task be broken down so that it is feasible for employees at all levels?
Do youth and wit always trump city and cunning?Is this true or false?The answer is wrong.Even the brightest minds are often consumed by politics and intrigue.Organizational politics is an inescapable reality of corporate and public life.Even when an organization has reached a tipping point for implementing strategy, there are powerful vested interests that resist impending change (see our discussion of barriers to acceptance in Chapter 6).The more likely change is to occur, the more violently these opponents, both inside and outside the organization, will fight to protect its position.And their resistance can seriously damage or even subvert the process of strategy execution.
To subdue these political forces, Tipping Point leaders need to focus on three methodologically influential factors: harnessing the power of the angels, silencing the devil, and finding a counselor for their management team.Angels are the ones who gain the most from strategic transformation, and devils are the ones who lose the most from it.A political veteran and internally respected, a strategist knows all the mines in advance, including who will fight you and who will support you.
Most leaders focus on building a top management team with professional skills in market efficiency, operations, finance, etc., which is of course very important.However, Tipping Point leaders also employ a role that other leaders seldom fill: strategist.For this purpose, Breton, for example, makes sure his team has a well-respected insider within the organization who knows exactly what landmines to step on when implementing a new policing strategy.In the NYPD, Brayton named John Timoney (now Miami's police chief) second in command.Timoney is a cop of the police, respected and feared by others with more than 60 awards and recognitions for his selfless work in the NYPD.Having served for more than 20 years, he not only knows all the key players well, but also knows how they play political games.One of Timoney's first assignments was to report to Brayton on the attitude of senior officers to the NYPD's new policing strategy, and who among them would oppose or undermine its implementation, leading to a major reshuffle of the police department. .
To overcome political obstacles, you also need to ask yourself two sets of questions:
*Who is my devil?Who will be against me?Who will lose the most in the future blue ocean strategy?
* Who is my angel?Who will naturally be on my side?Who will benefit the most from the future blue ocean strategy?
Don't do it alone.争取最高级别、最广范围的的支持，同你并肩战斗。找出攻击你的人和支持你的人，不要管中间的那些人，并努力为处于两端的双方创造双赢的效果。行动要快速，在战斗开始前就与你的天使们建立广泛的同盟，孤立你的敌对者。这样，你就能不战而屈人之兵。
对布雷顿新治安战略最严重的威胁之一来自于纽约市法院。由于布雷顿新治安战略将重点放在对付影响老百姓生活质量的犯罪上，这将导致大批如卖淫和在公众场合醉酒等小案件蜂拥而来，使司法系统疲于处理，因此法院反对战略转型。为克服这一障碍，布雷顿对他的支持者，包括市长、地方检察官和监狱管理者，清晰地解释了法院系统实际上是能处理额外增加犯罪案件的，而且长远来看，这样做将减少案件发生，减轻他们的工作量。于是，市长决定进行干预。
由市长领头，布雷顿的同盟者在新闻媒体上主动传达了一条清晰而简单的信息：如果法院不尽他们那份义务，这个城市的犯罪率就不会降低。布雷顿通过市长办公室与难以几家主要报刊联合起来，成功地孤立了法院。法院很难再去公然反对这项动议，因为这项动议能使纽约变得更成对居民更有吸引力的城市，而且最终也将减少法院受理的案件数量。由于市长主动在媒体上强调，扑灭影响生活质量的犯罪是多么的必要，而纽约最具权威的自由派报刊也对新治安战略表示信任，这就使反对布雷顿的战略显得代价惊人。布雷顿由此赢得了这场战斗：法院决定合作。他也赢得了整个战役：犯罪率确实降低了。
战胜毁谤者或魔鬼的关键在于，弄清他们所有的攻击角度，并以无可辩驳的事实和理由来反驳他们的指责。例如，当要求纽约警察局各警署的指挥官编制详细的犯罪数据和图表时，他们表示了反对，声称这将耗费太多时间。布雷顿早已预料到会有这样的反应，因此事先已经演习了一遍整个过程，结果显示，每天不超过18分钟，只占平均工作量的1％。有了无可辩驳的信息，他就能突破政治的障碍，不战而胜。
在你的高层管理团队中，有一位受人尊敬、了解内情的谋士吗？还是仅有一位财务总监或其它部门领导呢？你知道谁会反对、谁又会支持你的新战略吗？你是否已经与天然盟友建立了同盟，来包围那些反对者？你的谋士是否已排除了最大的地雷，以免你浪费时间和精力，去改变那些不愿改变也不会改变的人了吗？
如图7－3所示，组织变革的传统理论强调改变大众，因此变革努力的重点也在于推动大众，这就需要非常多的资源和时间，以致很少领导人能负担得起。与之相对的是，引爆点领导法反其道而行之，为了改变大众，先将重点放在改变极端的人和事，即那些对绩效有非凡影响力的人物、行为和活动。通过改变极端，引爆点领导者就能低成本地迅速改变组织的核心部分，以执行蓝海战略。
进行战略转型从来不是容易的事，而要低成本地迅速推进就更困难了。然而我们的研究表明，通过发挥引爆点领导法的杠杆作用，我们可以做到这一点。只要能掌握战略执行的障碍是什么，并将重点放在具有非凡影响力的因素上，你就可以突破障碍实现转型。不要盲从常识和成见，并非每一次挑战都需投入相同比例的资源，而是要着力于具有非凡影响力的行为。这是实现蓝海战略的重要领导技巧，它能统一和协调员工的行动，向新战略迈进。
下一章将再深入一步，解决如何通过建立信任、忠诚、自愿合作的企业文化、以及对领导的支持，来获得大家对新战略的全心全意的支持。只有克服了这个挑战，人们才不会觉得是被动地执行战略，而是能够自觉自愿地执行战略，
And unlike traditional experience, Brayton achieved such a breakthrough in record time with minimal resources: improved employee morale and created a win-win situation for all parties.And this is not the first time Breton has turned things around strategically, but his fifth, and the other four have also succeeded.Although he also faced all four barriers that many managers consistently claim limit their ability to execute blue ocean strategy: cognitive barriers that prevent employees from seeing the need for drastic change; resource barriers common to businesses; morale barriers that discourage employees; and Internal and external political barriers to change (see Figure 7-1).
The tipping point leadership approach dates back to the field of epidemiology and the tipping point theory.This approach shows that in any organization, once people's confidence and energy reach a tipping point, they can infect the entire organization to move in a certain direction, and fundamental change occurs.The key to launching such a movement is concentration, not dispersion.
Tipping point leadership is based on the seldom exploited fact that in every organization there are some people, some behaviors, or activities that exert a remarkable influence on the ultimate performance.Therefore, unlike traditional experience, overcoming a huge challenge does not require a proportional investment of time and resources, but instead focuses on identifying the key factors with extraordinary influence and letting them play a role. Save resources and time.
Managers who use the explosive leadership approach answer the following key questions: What factors or actions have the extraordinary positive impact?What factors produce the greatest effectiveness per dollar of resources?What motivates key personnel to move towards change?What factors can overcome the obstacles posed by corporate politics?As long as you focus on the key points with extraordinary influence, the tipping point leadership method can break the four barriers that limit the implementation of blue ocean strategy, and promote the rapid and low-cost implementation of strategy.
Exactly how to give full play to the leverage of extraordinary influencing factors, overcome the four major obstacles, turn thoughts into actions, and promote the implementation of blue ocean strategy.
In the process of enterprise change, the most difficult battle is to make people understand the need for strategic transformation and to form a consensus on its goals.Most CEOs hope to complete the transformation only by citing some numbers and issuing higher indicators: "The performance of the enterprise has only two choices: meet these goals or exceed these goals"
But we know that numbers can be manipulated.Insisting on broad goals will only encourage a runaway budget process.This in turn creates hostility and suspicion in all parts of the organization.Even if these figures are not manipulated, they can have the effect of misleading, for example, salespeople who take commissions rarely care about the cost of sales.
Also, information expressed numerically can be difficult to remember.The case for change appears abstract and far removed from the world of the bottom line managers, the very people CEOs need to woo.The line managers who did well felt that the criticism was not aimed at them, that the problem was only with upper management.And the underperforming managers feel they are being warned, some of them worried about their positions, and may be more concerned with what other job opportunities are in the market than with trying to fix the company's existing problems.
The tipping point leadership approach does not rely on numbers to break down organizational cognitive barriers.To quickly overcome cognitive hurdles, Tipping Point leaders like Brayton focus their energies on actions with extraordinary impact: making people see and experience harsh realities.Research in neuroscience and cognitive science has shown that people remember and respond most to what they see and experience, and "what you see is what you believe."In terms of experience, positive stimuli reinforce behavior, while negative stimuli change attitudes and behavior.Simply put, the better a child dips his finger in icing and tastes it, the better it tastes the more he will lick it again and again, without parents needing to encourage the behavior.Conversely, if a child sticks his finger to the stove, he will never stick it a second time.After one bad experience, the child will change his behavior on his own, again without the need for parents to worry about repeating the same offense.On the other hand, experiences with no-contact, invisible, or hard-to-perceive consequences, such as seeing only a page full of abstract numbers, are less impressive and easily forgotten.
Tipping Point Leadership is built on a deep understanding of people's voluntary inner drive to spark rapid change, rather than breaking down cognitive barriers with numbers, numbers can only make people feel the need for change in a radically different way .
To break out of the status quo, employees must face their worst problems.Managers at any level cannot be allowed to assume reality.Numbers are not necessarily reliable, nor can they give you inspiration.Confronting poor performance is shocking, inescapable, and motivating.This direct experience has an extraordinary impact in quickly breaking down people's cognitive barriers.
For example, the New York subway in the 1990s was so full of fear that it was nicknamed the "electric sewer."Its income plummeted because of the boycott of the subway.But members of the New York Transit Police Department denied this.why?Only 3% of major crimes in this city happen on the subway.Therefore, no matter how loudly the public shouted, the police department turned a deaf ear to it, and there was no need to reflect on the need to adjust the police strategy.
At this time Brayton became the chief, and within a few weeks he changed the state of mind of the police.How?Not by coercion, or arguing over numbers.Instead, let the middle and high-level executives-starting with himself-go to sit in the "electrical sewer" sooner or later.And that didn't happen before Breton arrived.
The statistics on the screens tell the cops it's safe to ride the subway, but what they see is what every New Yorker faces every day, that the subway system is on the brink of anarchy: hordes of young people Loitering in the carriages, fare evaders jumping through the entrance, graffiti and beggars forcibly begging everywhere, drunkards occupy the seats in disorder.After a field ride, police officers can no longer hide from the ugly reality, and no one can debate whether current police strategy needs to be changed quickly and effectively.
Presenting the worst reality to your boss can also quickly change their ideology.A simple method can quickly sensitize the boss to the needs of leadership.However, few leaders know how to use the power of this quick wake-up method. On the contrary, they use numbers that lack a sense of urgency and emotional drive, or cite some typical examples to gain support.While these approaches may be effective, they are nowhere near as swift and effective at breaking through executives' cognitive barriers as a worst-case scenario.
For example, when Brayton was in charge of the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority Police Division, the Transit Authority board decided to buy small patrol cars that were cheap and low-maintenance.This does not satisfy Breton's vigilante patrol strategy.Breton chose not to fight the decision, nor did he ask for a larger budget, which would take months to evaluate and could ultimately be rejected anyway.Instead, Brayton simply invited the general manager of the Transit Authority to visit his unit and inspect the area.
To make the general manager understand the dire situation he was trying to rectify, Brayton picked him up in a police car identical to the one the Transit Authority was about to order.He stuffed things around the seats beforehand, giving the general manager a sense of how little legroom a six-foot cop has, and then Brayton drove through every pothole in the road.Brayton also put on a belt, handcuffs, and a gun to show the general manager how little space an officer has for their tools.Two hours later, the general manager asked to get out of the car, asking how Brayton could have endured so long in such a crowded car, let alone with the criminal in the back.Brayton finally got the big patrol cars his new strategy needed.
To break down the cognitive barrier, not only do you need to get your managers out of the office to see what's really going on, but you need them to listen to customer complaints themselves.Instead of relying on market research, to what extent has your team proactively and intuitively understood the market and met with the most disgruntled customers to hear what they care about?Have you ever figured out why sales didn't match your expectations for the product?Simply put, there is no substitute for meeting and listening to customer grievances directly.
In the 1970s, Boston's 4th police precinct, home to Symphony Hall, the Christian Science Church and other cultural institutions, was suffering from a crime wave, and the public was constantly threatened by crime; Difference.But even with the exodus, Brayton's police force feels like it's doing a good job, and its performance metrics are top-notch compared with other police departments: Shorter call response times and higher felony detection rates.To resolve this paradox, Brayton arranged a series of conversations between officers and residents.
It didn't take long to find the gap in understanding.While officers prided themselves on improved response times and felony punishments, citizens neither cared nor appreciated these gains; few felt threatened by mass crime.It is the drunkards, beggars, whores, and knaves who hurt and trouble them.
The dialogue will cause the police to thoroughly review the focus of their work, turn to the blue ocean strategy, and re-examine the "broken windows theory."As the crime rate drops, the neighborhood regains its tranquility.
When it comes time to wake your organization up to the need to disrupt the status quo and achieve strategic transformation, do you just cite numbers?Or put your managers, employees, and superiors (and yourself) in the worst possible operating situation?Are your managers listening directly to the complaints of disappointed customers?Or outsource your eyesight and just have a market research agency send out surveys?
After members of the organization accept the need for a strategic shift and agree somewhat to the framework of the new strategy, most leaders face the harsh reality of limited resources.At this point, the vast majority of reformist managers choose one of two approaches. They either become less ambitious, thereby reducing staff morale and effort, or talk to the banks and shareholders. Fight for more resources, the latter is not only time-consuming, but also distracts from core issues.Not that this approach is necessarily unnecessary or worthwhile, but getting more resources is often a lengthy, politically bound process.
How can the strategic transformation of an organization be achieved with few resources?The tipping point leadership method does not focus on striving for more resources, but also emphasizes the value of existing resources.When resources are scarce, leaders should leverage the three factors of extraordinary influence to multiply the value of existing resources.These three factors are: hot spots, cold spots and horse trading.
A hotspot is an activity with a high potential performance gain that requires little resource investment.Conversely, a cold spot refers to an activity that involves a lot of effort but yields little.Every organization typically has many hot and cold spots.Exchanging supplies is to exchange excess resources in one area of your unit with excess resources in another unit to fill in the resource gap.By learning to make good use of current resources, companies often find that they can completely break down resource barriers.
Which actions consume a lot of your resources with little performance impact?Conversely, which activities create the greatest performance with few resources?By framing the problem in this way, the organization can quickly gain insight into the need to free up low-yield resources and reallocate them to high-yield places.In this way, low cost and high profit can be pursued and realized at the same time.
Brayton's predecessors in the New York Transit Police Department argued that the subway should be safe by having an officer ride every line and patrol every entrance and exit.Increasing profits (here refers to reducing crime) means that costs (referring to police officers) will increase to a level that cannot be supported by the budget. The basic logic is that only when resources increase year-on-year will performance improve-this is exactly what most companies see in terms of performance benefits internal logic.
Instead of asking for more officers, however, Brayton deployed police to hotspots, causing crime, fear, and chaos on the subway to drop dramatically to record lows.His analysis shows that although the subway system consists of many lines and entrances and exits, most crimes occur on a few stations and lines.He also found that some hotspots that have a particularly high impact on crime prevention are understaffed, while lines and stops where almost no crime occurs have just as many police officers.The answer is to reallocate the police force to hotspots to fight crime, so that the crime rate will drop significantly while the police force remains the same.
Similarly, before Brayton came to the New York Police Department, its Narcotics Division was on duty 9 to 5, five days a week, and its manpower accounted for only 5% of the entire police department.To identify hotspots, during a meeting with NYPD leaders, Bratton's Deputy Commissioner for Crime Strategies, Jack Maipe, asked the audience what percentage of crime was estimated to be related to drug use?Most answered 50%, some said 70%, and the lowest estimate was 30%.So, as Maipu pointed out, the Narcotics Division, which accounts for less than 5% of the total police officers, is understaffed. The Narcotics Division usually works from Monday to Friday, but most of the drug dealing occurs on weekends. Drug-related crimes also always happen on weekends.Why was the original working method never questioned?
When these facts are found, hot spots are also identified.Brayton's proposal for a massive reconfiguration of police force and resources in the NYPD was quickly embraced.In response, Brayton added police and resources to hotspots, and drug crimes plummeted as a result.
Where did he get the resources to do so?It turned out that he also assessed the cold spots of the organization at the same time.
Leaders need to find cold spots to free up resources.Still taking the subway system as an example, Brayton found that one of the biggest cold spots was the process of escorting criminals to court for detention procedures.On average, it takes officers 16 hours to bring a suspect to an inner-city courthouse, which must be the case for even the most minor of crimes.The time spent prevents officers from patrolling subways and creating value.
Breton made a radical change in this.Instead of taking criminals to court, "arrest vans" are used as processing centers.Old buses, refurbished into miniature police stations, stop right outside the subway station.Instead of taking a suspect to a downtown courthouse, officers simply escort him to an arrest van on the side of the street.This cut the processing time from 16 hours to one hour, giving officers more time to patrol the subway to catch criminals.
In addition to redeploying resources within a unit, tipping point leaders can skillfully exchange resources they don't want for those they want.Again in Breton's case, the heads of public sector organizations know that because public sector resources are very limited, the size of their budgets and the number of people they manage are often hotly debated, which makes them reluctant to publish their excess resources, let alone make them available to other departments, because that would risk losing control of those resources.Over time, the result is that some organizations have a surplus of resources they don't need and a shortage of resources they need.
Brayton's legal and policy advisor, Dean Eiseman (now Rhode Island's police chief), played a key dealmaker role when he first became New York's traffic police commissioner in 1990.Eiseman found that the Transit Police Department was short on office space and had many spare cars that weren't being used.On the other hand, the New York Patrol Detachment is short on vehicles, but has ample office space.Eiseman and Brayton offered to trade the vehicle for the office, and officers from the patrol detachment readily accepted.The officers of the Transit Police Department are also very happy to be able to work in a prime location in the city center.The deal boosted Brayton's credibility within the organization, making it easier for him to push through some more fundamental changes, while also convincing his bosses that he was a problem solver.
Figure 7-2 illustrates how Breton thoroughly deployed the resources of the Transport Police Department to break through the red ocean state and implement the blue ocean strategy.The vertical axis represents the relative level of resource allocation, and the horizontal axis represents the different elements of the investment strategy.By weakening or even removing some of the traditional features of the Transit Police Department, while adding and creating some new ones, Brayton achieved a dramatic shift in the allocation of resources.
Figure 7-2
Elimination and reduction actions reduce costs for the organization, while addition and creation of new elements require increased investment.
However, as can be seen in the strategic layout map, the total investment of resources remains basically unchanged, while the value to citizens has increased significantly. The practice of police coverage in the subway system has been canceled and replaced with a target strategy for hotspot areas, making transportation Police departments can respond more effectively to subway crime.It reduces the time and energy that police officers spend on the detention process and other cold-spot activities, creates the practice of using arrest cars to deal with suspects, and allows police forces to focus on maintaining law and order in the subway, thereby greatly increasing the value of the police force.Increase investment in dealing with daily crime activities, rather than investment in major cases, and the focus of police resources is on those crimes that pose a threat to the daily lives of citizens.Through these actions, the New York Transit Police Department has significantly improved the performance of its officers, freeing them from tedious administrative tasks to focus on crime scenes where they are focused.
Are you still reporting on stale assumptions when allocating resources?Or is it an effort to focus resources on hotspots?Where is your hotspot?Which activities are the most performant and resource-scarce?What are your cool spots?Which activities are consuming resources but not performing well?Do you communicate with each other?And do you have those things that can be used to communicate with each other?
In order to reach the tipping point of the organization and implement the blue ocean strategy, you must let employees clearly understand the necessity of strategic transformation and specify how to achieve the goal with limited resources.For a new strategy or an action to be taken, people not only need to realize what needs to be done, but they must put this knowledge into practice in a lasting and effective way.
How can you motivate your employees quickly and cheaply?When most business leaders need to disrupt the status quo or transform an organization, they often articulate grand strategic views and engage in massive top-down mobilization.This is because they believe that to achieve a large-scale response, there must be a corresponding large-scale action.But for most large companies, large-scale mobilization is not only very difficult, but also an expensive and time-consuming process.It is as impossible to realize those major strategic assumptions by only talking about it without putting it into sincere actions, which is tantamount to turning around an aircraft carrier in a bathtub.
So is there another way?Instead of attacking on all fours and spreading out change efforts, Tipping Point leaders strive for a centralized breakthrough in which they focus on three extraordinary factors to motivate employees, which we call kingpins, fishbowl, and task breakdown ( atomization).
For strategic change to have real impact, employees at all levels must act together.However, if you want the power of positive change to have a broad mass base within the organization, you cannot disperse your focus, but should concentrate on the key influencers of the organization, that is, the masterminds.They are natural leaders in the organization, respected, persuasive, or capable of opening resources or blocking passage.Just like the central pin in bowling, hit them and the other pins will be knocked down.This prevents the organization from dealing with everyone, but in the end everyone is touched.Since masterminds are a relatively small minority in most organizations, it is easy for the CEO to target and mobilize them.
In the New York City Police Department, for example, Brayton counted 76 department commanders as his key influencers and masterminds.Why?Because the commander of each police station directly controls 200 to 400 police officers, motivating these 76 commanders can drive and inspire 36,000 police officers to accept the new security management strategy.
To continuously and effectively mobilize the enthusiasm of mastermind characters, the key is to be able to continuously put their behavior under the spotlight so that people can see it. We call it fishbowl management.Putting a mastermind in a fishbowl greatly increases the risk of his inaction.The laggards are revealed under the lights, and the rapid changers can also shine on the stage.To be successful, aquarium management must be based on transparency, inclusiveness, and process fairness.
In the NYPD, Brayton's Fishbowl is part of the biweekly Crime Suppression Strategy Review (Compstat).The meeting brought together the city's top police officers to assess the performance of all 76 police department commanders in implementing the new strategy.The commanders of each police station are also required to attend, and above the sheriff, the deputy chief and the district police chief are also required to attend.Breton himself tried to be present.Each department commander was asked at the meeting whether their crime-stopping performance had improved or decreased under the new strategy, and the graphs were displayed simultaneously, conclusively showing their performance in implementing the new strategy.Commanders must interpret the charts, describe how their officers solve problems, and account for increases and decreases in performance.This wide-ranging meeting shows the results and responsibilities clearly in front of everyone.
The result of this approach is that a strong performance culture develops in weeks rather than months, let alone years.Because no commander wants to lose face in front of others, they all want to show their hands in front of their colleagues and superiors.In a fishbowl, an incompetent police station commander cannot cover up his own faults by blaming a neighboring police station for its shortcomings, since representatives of the neighboring district are also present and ready to fire back.In fact, CSIS handouts include photos of police station commanders who will be questioned, emphasizing that commanders must be held accountable for police station results.
In the same way, excellent talents who work well in their own jurisdictions and assist other jurisdictions will also be appreciated and recognized by everyone because of fish tank management.At the same time, this kind of meeting also gives commanders an opportunity to get together, compare and learn from each other.Before Breton arrived, police commanders rarely got together as a team.Over time, this style of fish tank management permeated down to the grassroots, and police station commanders also followed Brayton's example and held their own strategic assessment meetings.With the performance of executing the strategy exposed, police commanders are highly motivated to move their officers toward the new strategy.
However, for this approach to work, the organization must also ensure that the way it operates is a fair process. A "fair process" means involving everyone affected by the new strategy, explaining the rationale for decisions, why officers are promoted or demoted, and clarifying expectations for officer performance.No one at the NYPD's Crime Deterrence Strategy Review would argue that the starting line is unfair.All masterminds are placed in a glass fishbowl, and the performance evaluation of each commander, as well as the reasons for promotion or demotion, are all clear and transparent, and each meeting sets clear rules for each person's future performance. expectations.
In this way, a fair-process signal is sent to people that while change must be driven, there is a level playing field and that leaders recognize the intellectual and emotional value of employees.This greatly reduces the skepticism that almost inevitably exists in every employee's mind when a company tries to make a strategic transformation.Fair process and fishbowl management's emphasis on pure performance drives and supports people on the path to change, while at the same time demonstrating the intellectual and emotional respect managers have for their employees.
A final and particularly effective influencing factor is decomposition thinking.Breaking down tasks and defining strategic challenges are linked, and this is one of the most delicate and sensitive tasks of Tipping Point leadership.Change cannot be successful unless people believe that the strategic challenge is achievable.Faced with this, Breton's goals in New York were so ambitious it was hard to believe.Who would believe that a single individual could turn this megacity from the most dangerous place in the country to the safest?Who would invest time and energy in chasing an impossible dream?
To make the goals of the challenge achievable, Brayton broke it down into small target tasks, linked to all levels of police officers.The challenge for the NYPD, as he puts it, is to restore safety to the streets of New York City "block by block, precinct by precinct, borough by borough."It is practical to define the strategic tasks in this way.For street patrol officers, the job is to keep the neighborhoods they patrol safe, nothing more.For the police station commander, his task is to ensure the safety of the police district under his jurisdiction, nothing more.And the person in charge of each large urban area also has a specific goal within his power, that is, to ensure the safety of the large urban area.No one can say that too much is required of them, nor claim that their goals are beyond their reach.In this way, the responsibility for implementing Bretton's blue ocean strategy shifted from himself to the NYPD's 36,000 officers.
Are you indiscriminately trying to mobilize the masses?Or are you focusing on key influencers, your masterminds?Have you turned on the spotlight and invited masterminds into a fishbowl based on a fair process?Or are you just asking for high performance and crossing your fingers until next quarter's statistics come in?Do you publish grand strategic visions?Or should the task be broken down so that it is feasible for employees at all levels?
Do youth and wit always trump city and cunning?Is this true or false?The answer is wrong.Even the brightest minds are often consumed by politics and intrigue.Organizational politics is an inescapable reality of corporate and public life.Even when an organization has reached a tipping point for implementing strategy, there are powerful vested interests that resist impending change (see our discussion of barriers to acceptance in Chapter 6).The more likely change is to occur, the more violently these opponents, both inside and outside the organization, will fight to protect its position.And their resistance can seriously damage or even subvert the process of strategy execution.
To subdue these political forces, Tipping Point leaders need to focus on three methodologically influential factors: harnessing the power of the angels, silencing the devil, and finding a counselor for their management team.Angels are the ones who gain the most from strategic transformation, and devils are the ones who lose the most from it.A political veteran and internally respected, a strategist knows all the mines in advance, including who will fight you and who will support you.
Most leaders focus on building a top management team with professional skills in market efficiency, operations, finance, etc., which is of course very important.However, Tipping Point leaders also employ a role that other leaders seldom fill: strategist.For this purpose, Breton, for example, makes sure his team has a well-respected insider within the organization who knows exactly what landmines to step on when implementing a new policing strategy.In the NYPD, Brayton named John Timoney (now Miami's police chief) second in command.Timoney is a cop of the police, respected and feared by others with more than 60 awards and recognitions for his selfless work in the NYPD.Having served for more than 20 years, he not only knows all the key players well, but also knows how they play political games.One of Timoney's first assignments was to report to Brayton on the attitude of senior officers to the NYPD's new policing strategy, and who among them would oppose or undermine its implementation, leading to a major reshuffle of the police department. .
To overcome political obstacles, you also need to ask yourself two sets of questions:
*Who is my devil?Who will be against me?Who will lose the most in the future blue ocean strategy?
* Who is my angel?Who will naturally be on my side?Who will benefit the most from the future blue ocean strategy?
Don't do it alone.争取最高级别、最广范围的的支持，同你并肩战斗。找出攻击你的人和支持你的人，不要管中间的那些人，并努力为处于两端的双方创造双赢的效果。行动要快速，在战斗开始前就与你的天使们建立广泛的同盟，孤立你的敌对者。这样，你就能不战而屈人之兵。
对布雷顿新治安战略最严重的威胁之一来自于纽约市法院。由于布雷顿新治安战略将重点放在对付影响老百姓生活质量的犯罪上，这将导致大批如卖淫和在公众场合醉酒等小案件蜂拥而来，使司法系统疲于处理，因此法院反对战略转型。为克服这一障碍，布雷顿对他的支持者，包括市长、地方检察官和监狱管理者，清晰地解释了法院系统实际上是能处理额外增加犯罪案件的，而且长远来看，这样做将减少案件发生，减轻他们的工作量。于是，市长决定进行干预。
由市长领头，布雷顿的同盟者在新闻媒体上主动传达了一条清晰而简单的信息：如果法院不尽他们那份义务，这个城市的犯罪率就不会降低。布雷顿通过市长办公室与难以几家主要报刊联合起来，成功地孤立了法院。法院很难再去公然反对这项动议，因为这项动议能使纽约变得更成对居民更有吸引力的城市，而且最终也将减少法院受理的案件数量。由于市长主动在媒体上强调，扑灭影响生活质量的犯罪是多么的必要，而纽约最具权威的自由派报刊也对新治安战略表示信任，这就使反对布雷顿的战略显得代价惊人。布雷顿由此赢得了这场战斗：法院决定合作。他也赢得了整个战役：犯罪率确实降低了。
战胜毁谤者或魔鬼的关键在于，弄清他们所有的攻击角度，并以无可辩驳的事实和理由来反驳他们的指责。例如，当要求纽约警察局各警署的指挥官编制详细的犯罪数据和图表时，他们表示了反对，声称这将耗费太多时间。布雷顿早已预料到会有这样的反应，因此事先已经演习了一遍整个过程，结果显示，每天不超过18分钟，只占平均工作量的1％。有了无可辩驳的信息，他就能突破政治的障碍，不战而胜。
在你的高层管理团队中，有一位受人尊敬、了解内情的谋士吗？还是仅有一位财务总监或其它部门领导呢？你知道谁会反对、谁又会支持你的新战略吗？你是否已经与天然盟友建立了同盟，来包围那些反对者？你的谋士是否已排除了最大的地雷，以免你浪费时间和精力，去改变那些不愿改变也不会改变的人了吗？
如图7－3所示，组织变革的传统理论强调改变大众，因此变革努力的重点也在于推动大众，这就需要非常多的资源和时间，以致很少领导人能负担得起。与之相对的是，引爆点领导法反其道而行之，为了改变大众，先将重点放在改变极端的人和事，即那些对绩效有非凡影响力的人物、行为和活动。通过改变极端，引爆点领导者就能低成本地迅速改变组织的核心部分，以执行蓝海战略。
进行战略转型从来不是容易的事，而要低成本地迅速推进就更困难了。然而我们的研究表明，通过发挥引爆点领导法的杠杆作用，我们可以做到这一点。只要能掌握战略执行的障碍是什么，并将重点放在具有非凡影响力的因素上，你就可以突破障碍实现转型。不要盲从常识和成见，并非每一次挑战都需投入相同比例的资源，而是要着力于具有非凡影响力的行为。这是实现蓝海战略的重要领导技巧，它能统一和协调员工的行动，向新战略迈进。
下一章将再深入一步，解决如何通过建立信任、忠诚、自愿合作的企业文化、以及对领导的支持，来获得大家对新战略的全心全意的支持。只有克服了这个挑战，人们才不会觉得是被动地执行战略，而是能够自觉自愿地执行战略，