This website covers knowledge management, personal effectiveness, theory of constraints, amongst other topics. Opinions expressed here are strictly those of the owner, Jack Vinson, and those of the commenters.

Is continued growth realistic?

Curves2I'm attending a TOC Application Expert upgrade in which we are talking about the latest details of the Viable Vision process as it applies to consultants like me: the Application Experts.  The primary goal of the Viable Vision is to set the company on a firm road to ongoing improvement, such that performance continually increases.  This is usually drawn as an exponentially increasing "red curve" (or The Purple Curve) and contrasted with the asymptotically limited "green curve."  Somewhere between the two is the standard, linear increase curve that most companies find themselves on (5% growth, year over year).  And then here is Paolina Martin's article on Managerial Delusions and Complex Decision-Making.

The other delusion is that of lasting success. Simply, it says that there is no such thing, well almost. With the free-market economy, profits tend to decline as a result of imitation and competition, which to me is like the “bloody red ocean” that Chan Kim and Mauborgne warned about. They suggest looking for blue ocean strategies through value innovation as the brand goes, based on assumptions and judgements on various factors of competition, including interestingly emotion (know how an umbrella means more than just its function).

I'm not so sure that "profits tend to decline" over time - it will certainly happen if the only thing happening is price competition and imitation are happening.  But aren't companies routinely getting 5 or 10% annual growth?  They do this through combinations of new products, new markets, lower costs, etc.

But the more interesting thing is that Red Curve.  That not implies more than strictly linear growth.  I'm not so familiar with the reference to the Blue Ocean Strategies book, but the headline says it all: "Don't compete with Rivals—Make Them Irrelevant."  Viable Vision states this a little differently, but the core to all Viable Vision projects is the building of a decisive competitive edge - something your competition can't match.  Decisive competitive edge comes from satisfying a significant need of your customers.

Buy-in and PKM

Desktop search replacing filing?