• Fantastic clients, whose challenges inspired us to bring our “A-Game” every day
• A fantastic board, who were a constant source of encouragement and support
• A fantastic team, who worked tirelessly to build the company
• A growing list of Shift Points readers, now dispersed all over the world
• A growing list of Dashboard partners and affiliates, who have helped us accomplish incredible things

We want to extend a big, heartfelt thank you to everyone.  You were a great gift this year.

As we look forward to 2012, we are more bullish than ever.  We look forward to working with all of you.

The Shift Points blog is designed for Fast Lane leaders who want to leave their competitors in the dust.

Shift Your Thinking … Accelerate Your Results.

In a recent interview with WashingtonExec, I used the following analogy:

Every startup goes through two distinct phases. The “drill for oil” phase involves months, and sometimes years of exploration and trial-and-error. This can involve chasing any deal that will pay the bills, even if it is out of your sweet spot. Eventually, however, the organization must mature and get focused. This is the “real enterprise” phase. This begins with identifying your One Thing, pruning the activities that don’t fit, and aligning every part of the organization to deliver it. Failure to make this transition is a root cause of plateaued growth.

I grew up in Philadelphia, and have never even been to an oil field. In fact, I learned everything I know about drilling for oil from The Beverly Hillbillies! However, I still think the analogy works. In fact, I think it’s a gusher!

To read the rest of the interview, click the link below:

http://www.washingtonexec.com/2011/09/qa-with-the-dashboard-group-founder-dave-ramos-from-drill-for-oil-to-real-enterprise/

PS: Thanks to Jennifer Edgerly from SpeakerBox Communications (www.speakerboxpr.com) for making this great story possible.

The Shift Points blog is designed for Fast Lane leaders who want to leave their competitors in the dust.

Shift Your Thinking…Accelerate Your Results.

1. What (exactly) is a high-performance organization?
2. What does it take to build one?
3. How can Dashboard help leaders do it?

After 10 years, 100 books, 100 CEO conversations and 10,000 hours, we finally have the answers.

We call it The Dashboard Way, and it includes five components:

1. Decide One Thing  –  which helps organizations identify their One Defining Differentiation
2. Design One Strategy  –  which helps organizations select the best strategic options
3. Drive One Direction  –  which helps organizations align their structure and systems with their strategy
4. Develop the #One Team  –  which helps organizations optimize their human capital
5. Deliver Every Time  –  which helps organizations optimize their customer experience

This methodology has been tested with all sorts of clients.  Construction companies, technology companies, government contractors, media companies, non-profits, churches, and more.

In addition, all of the components are fully integrated, which helps leaders avoid the “management by bestseller” phenomenon.

So, if you are serious about building a high-performance organization, we would love to show you the way – The Dashboard Way.

The Shift Points blog is designed for Fast Lane leaders who want to leave their competitors in the dust.

Shift Your Thinking … Accelerate Your Results.

Why?  Because these books – as good as they are – gave inconsistent and sometimes contradictory advice.  Leaders would apply the lessons from one bestseller … until the next bestseller came out, and then they would try to apply the advice from that one.

One friend labeled this phenomenon, “Management by Bestseller.”

So, over the past decade, the Dashboard Group has invested 10,000 hours (or more!) in developing a comprehensive methodology for building high-performance organizations.  We have integrated many of the great ideas from the bestsellers, and combined them with practical lessons from our work with clients. We have tested all of the ideas to make sure they are internally consistent and integrated.

We call this methodology The Dashboard Way.

Over the next weeks, we will be unveiling version 5 of The Dashboard Way.  (Although we call it version 5, it is more like version 500!)

The Shift Points blog is designed for Fast Lane leaders who want to leave their competitors in the dust.

Shift Your Thinking … Accelerate Your Results.

These CEOs were tremendously helpful as we worked to understand what it really takes to build a high-performance organization.  In addition to the conversations, we developed a 10 question High-Performance Organization Survey to provide hard data to supplement the anecdotal research.

Together, five themes emerged:

1.       Organizations struggle with differentiation.  Many had hedgehogs, but still waffled in a sea of sameness.

2.       Organizations struggle with strategy.  Most had no strategy development process and basically defined their strategy as working harder and doing more.

3.       Organizations struggle with alignment.  As they grew, they became fragmented and inefficient.

4.       Organizations struggle with people issues.  Most CEOs were frustrated with the performance of their people.

5.       Organizations struggle to meet commitments.  Many promise all kinds of things to win the deal, but end up under-delivering.

These five themes have shaped the development of The Dashboard Way, our methodology for building high-performance organizations.  More on this next week.

The Shift Points blog is designed for Fast Lane leaders who want to leave their competitors in the dust.

Shift Your Thinking … Accelerate Your Results.

Can I hear an AMEN to that!

To address this issue I have spent the last 10 years working to answer three questions:

1. What (exactly) is a high-performance organization?
2. What does it take to build one?
3. How can Dashboard help leaders do it?

The process started with an intense period of reading and research.  Conservatively, I’ve read 100 books on the subject.  For awhile, I was reading a book a day.  Then, as the business took off, I backed-down to a book a week.

I am so grateful to the authors who took the time to document their findings in books.  I’ve listed some of the most helpful ones in the High Beams list on the Dashboard Group website here:  http://www.dashboardgroup.com/pages/page.asp?page_id=65485

However, after reading over 100 books, I decided that none of them had a comprehensive model to help leaders build a high-performance organization.  So, I decided to build one myself.

More on that next week.

The Shift Points blog is designed for Fast Lane leaders who want to leave their competitors in the dust.

Shift Your Thinking … Accelerate Your Results.

For 18 years, I had the great pleasure of working for two fantastic organizations in their hey-day:  IBM and Nortel Networks.  At the time, both were exceptionally well-managed and taught me a great deal about building high-performance organizations.

Then, I had two back-to-back experiences that changed the trajectory of my career.

First, Nortel bought Bay Networks.  I moved from Dallas to Silicon Valley to be the VP of Global Marketing at the newly created division.  I encountered the most dysfunctional organization I had ever seen.  The integration was a disaster.  My boss (who was from Bay) hated me, and six months later, we were packing our bags.

I then joined a venture-backed startup in DC called AnswerLogic.  Much to my disappointment, it was even more dysfunctional than Bay Networks.  The leadership team (of which I was a part) fought all the time.  So did the board.  12 months later, I was packing my bags again.  When I resigned from AnswerLogic, I wrote this line in my journal:

Life is too short to work in a dysfunctional organization.

I’ve dedicated the last ten years to helping leaders build high-performance organizations.  It has been an amazing journey.  More on the process next week.

The Shift Points blog is designed for Fast Lane leaders who want to leave their competitors in the dust.

Shift Your Thinking … Accelerate Your Results.

Years ago, we decided to implement a unique customer satisfaction-based billing model.  This model allows our client to multiply our invoice amount by their satisfaction percentage, and then just pay what they feel the services were worth.

Of course, some people thought we were crazy for doing this.  They argued that the clients would take advantage of us.  (In fact, just the opposite has happened.)

This model works because it is built on a foundation of trust.  After all, how can we expect our clients to trust us if we don’t trust them?

We got some nice coverage in the Never Stop Marketing blog about this.  You can read the story here:  http://neverstopmarketing.com/.  (Thanks to Paul Farrell, CEO of Moreover Technologies (www.moreover.com) and a member of our board for the plug.)

The Shift Points blog is designed for Fast Lane leaders who want to leave their competitors in the dust.

Shift Your Thinking … Accelerate Your Results.

Our first posting was called Shifting Gears.  We discussed how taking your business to the next level requires a shift … in strategy, in operations, in sales and marketing … all at the same time.  It was this idea that inspired the name, Shift Points.

And I am excited to report that The Dashboard Group is now at one of those Shift Points ourselves.  You will be hearing lots more about all of the exciting news in the coming weeks.

For now, let me close the year by thanking all who have brought us to this point.

• Our fantastic clients taught us a great deal.  It has been our honor to be a part of their teams.
• Our world-class board provided invaluable insights and wisdom.
• Our many friends and followers encouraged us to press on through the difficult times.
• Our dedicated staff made it all possible.  Together, we are living the dream.

Full speed ahead!

The Shift Points blog is designed for Fast Lane leaders who want to leave their competitors in the dust.

Shift Your Thinking … Accelerate Your Results.

Based on experience compiled from a wide range of industries, organizations, and functional disciplines, we developed The Dashboard Way of building a high-performance organization.